GIFT  OF 
SEELEY  W.  MUDD 

and 

GEORGE  I.  COCHRAN    MEYER  ELSASSER 
DR.  JOHN  R.  HAYNES    WILLIAM  L.  HONNOLD 
JAMES  R.  MARTIN         MRS.  JOSEPH  F.  SARTORI 

to  the 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
SOUTHERN  BRANCH 


JOHN  FISKE 


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THE  WITNESS  TO  IMMORTALITY  IN  LITER- 
ATURE, PHILOSOPHY.  AND  LIFE.  i2mo, 
gilt  top,  $1.50. 

THE  CHRIST  OF  TO-DAY.  umo,  gilt  top, 
$1.50. 

IMMORTALITY  AND  THE  NEW  THEODICY. 
i6mo,  gilt  top,  $1.00. 

HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  AND   COMPANY, 

BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK. 


IMMORTALITY  AND  THE 
NEW  THEODICY 


BY 

GEORGE  A.   GORDON 

MINISTER  OF  THE  OLD  SOUTH  CHURCH,   BOSTON 


BOSTON  AND   NEW  YORK 
HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  AND  COMPANY 


i897 

87024 


Copyright,  1897, 
BY  GEORGE  A.  GORDON. 

All  rights  reserved. 


THIRD   EDITION. 


The  Riverside  Press,  Cambridge,  Mass.,  U.  S.  A. 
Electrotyped  and  Printed  by  H.  O.  Houghton  and  Company, 


IBT 
92  1 


To 

R.  M.  G. 
PSALM  cxii.  4. 


THE    INGERSOLL   LECTURESHIP 


Extract  from  the  will  of  Miss  Caroline  Haskell  Ingersoll, 

•who  died  in  Keene,  County  of  Cheshire,  New 

Hampshire,  Jan.  26,  1893. 

First.  In  carrying  out  the  wishes  of  my  late 
beloved  father,  George  Goldthwait  Ingersoll,  as 
declared  by  him  in  his  last  will  and  testament,  I 

five  and  bequeath  to  Harvard  University  in  Cam- 
ridge,  Mass.,  where  my  late  father  was  graduated, 
and  which  he  always  held  in  love  and  honor,  the 
sum  of  Five  thousand  dollars  ($5,000)  as  a  fund  for 
the  establishment  of  a  Lectureship  on  a  plan  some- 
what similar  to  that  of  the  Dudleian  lecture,  that  is 
—  one  lecture  to  be  delivered  each  year,  on  any  con- 
venient day  between  the  last  day  of  May  and  the 
first  day  of  December,  on  this  subject,  "the  Im- 
mortality of  Man,"  said  lecture  not  to  form  a  part 
of  the  usual  college  course,  nor  to  be  delivered  by 
'   any  Professor  or  Tutor  as  part  of  his  usual  routine 
S  of  instruction,  though  any  such  Professor  or  Tutor 
(3>  may  be  appointed  to  such  service.     The  choice  of 
rH   said  lecturer  is  not  to  be  limited  to  any  one  religious 
denomination,  nor  to  any  one  profession,  but  may 
d)   be  that  of  either  clergyman  or  layman,  the  appoint- 
rM   ment  to  take  place  at  least  six  months  before  the 
a   delivery  of  said  lecture.     The  above  sum  to  be 
j£    safely  invested  and  three  fourths  of  the  annual  in- 
"*   terest  thereof  to   be   paid  to  the  lecturer  for  his 
services  and  the  remaining  fourth  to  be  expended 
in  the  publishment  and  gratuitous  distribution  of 
the   lecture,  a  copy  of  which  is  always  to  be  fur- 
nished by  the  lecturer  for  such  purpose.     The  same 
lecture  to  be  named  and  known  as  "  the  Ingersoll 
lecture  on  the  Immortality  of  Man." 


Every  one  of  my  fellow-creatures  who  leaves  this  earthly 
brotherhood,  and  whom,  because  he  is  my  brother,  my  spirit 
cannot  regard  as  annihilated,  draws  my  thoughts  after  him 
beyond  the  grave  ;  he  is  still,  and  to  him  there  belongs  a  flace. 
While  we  mourn  for  him  here  below,  —  as  in  the  dim  realms 
of  unconsciousness  there  might  be  mourning  when  a  man 
bursts  from  them  into  the  light  of  this  world's  sun, —  above 
there  is  rejoicing  that  a  man  is  born  into  that  world,  as  we 
citizens  of  earth  receive  with  joy  those  who  are  born  unto  us. 
When  I  shall  one  day  follow,  it  will  be  but  joy  for  me  ;  sorrow 
shall  remain  behind  in  the  sphere  I  shall  have  left. 

FICHTE. 


PREFACE 

HE  following  essay  was  written 
under  the  appointment  by  which 
the  author  was  honored,  as  first 
Ingersoll  lecturer  upon  "The  Immortality 
of  Man,"  in  Harvard  University.  The 
appointment  was  received  as  a  fresh  call  to 
return  to  a  subject  that  for  many  years  has 
occupied  much  of  the  writer's  thought. 
Since  the  publication,  four  years  ago,  of  his 
book,  "The  Witness  to  Immortality,"  new 
lines  of  argument  have  been  suggested ; 
and  what  is  here  offered  to  the  public,  in 
accordance  with  the  terms  of  the  Ingersoll 
bequest,  although  standing  entirely  by  itself 
and  resting  solely  on  its  own  merits,  may 
be  considered  as  supplementary  to  the  ear- 
lier and  larger  work. 

It  must  be  understood  that  the  essay  is 
a  discussion  purely  upon  rational  grounds. 


viii  Preface 

While  it  is  impossible  for  the  writer  to 
reason  as  if  Christianity  had  never  been,  or 
to  ignore  its  supreme  insight  reigning  in 
the  moral  consciousness  of  our  great  divi- 
sion of  mankind,  or  to  appear  upon  this  or 
any  other  field  of  inquiry  in  any  character 
other  than  that  of  a  teacher  of  religion,  he 
has  still  set  before  himself  a  philosophical 
endeavor,  and  has  therefore  considered  it 
inadmissible  to  introduce  into  the  argu- 
ment the  ultimate  basis  of  Christian  belief 
in  the  future  life,  the  resurrection  of  Christ. 
The  special  feature  of  the  essay  is  indi- 
cated by  the  term  theodicy.  The  shadow 
that  lies  upon  the  universe  cannot  hide  its 
abiding  moral  order  as  revealed  in  human 
history.  The  attempt  is  therefore  made, 
after  the  ground  is  cleared  of  the  obstruc- 
tion presented  by  a  materialistic  psycho- 
logy, to  carry  the  question  of  the  immor- 
tality of  man  to  the  moral  conception  of 
the  universe  for  determination.  It  is  be- 
lieved that  upon  the  validity  and  integrity 
of  the  moral  idea  of  the  universe  the  entire 


Preface  ix 

question  turns.  To  exhibit  that  idea  in  its 
purity  and  absoluteness,  in  its  freedom 
from  the  great  historic  limitations  that  have 
been  fixed  upon  it  and  in  its  fruitfulness 
for  faith,  has  been  considered  essential  to 
the  undertaking.  The  full  strength  of  the 
logic  of  a  universe  conceived  as  absolutely 
righteous  was  deemed  a  necessity  of  the 
case.  This  accounts  for  the  polemic  in 
certain  sections.  It  is  a  sincere  sorrow 
to  be  obliged  to  differ  upon  some  points 
from  able  and  honored  men  with  whom,  in 
general,  the  writer  is  in  profound  agree- 
ment ;  but  when  the  appeal  is  to  the  full 
and  honest  mind  of  the  individual,  above 
all  when  the  truth  is  believed  to  be  at  stake 
and  the  life  of  humanity  involved,  the  sor- 
row must  be  borne.  In  justification  of  his 
protest  against  Homer's  orthodoxy,  Plato 

thought  it  sufficient  to  Say  dAA'  ov  yap  irpo  ye 
TT}S  dA?70£tas  Tiftr^reos  avr)p.  And  when  it  Came 

Plato's  turn,  the  polemic  was  again  vindi- 
cated almost  in  his  own  words  a^oiv  yap 
OVTOW  <j*i\oiv  ocriov  Trpori/xav  TT)V  dAi^etav.  It  is 


x  Preface 

the  purpose  recognized  by  this  canon  that 
absolves  a  writer  from  the  charge  of  a  want 
of  reverence  for  the  past  when  he  is  com- 
pelled to  contend  against  it,  and  that  sup- 
ports the  rights  of  adverse  criticism  upon 
his  own  work.  When  it  is  the  sword  of 
the  spirit  by  which  a  man  seeks  to  live,  he 
could  ask  no  happier  fate  than  to  die  by  it. 


CONTENTS    . 

PAGE 

I.  CONDITIONS  OF  THE  DISCUSSION  ....  i 

II.  SIGNS  OF  HOPE .  9 

III.  THE  DEEPER  ISSUES  OF  THE  DEBATE  .    .  16 

IV.  THE  EVIDENCE  FOR  THE  DENIAL     ...  26 
V.  VALUE  OF  THE  EVIDENCE  FOR  DENIAL    .  32 

VI.  POSTULATES  OF  IMMORTALITY  ...        -45 

VII.  ILLOGICAL  LIMITATIONS   .......    63 

VIII.  THE  NEW  HUMANITY 81 

IX.  THE  NEW  THEATRE  FOR  THE  ABSOLUTE 

MORAL  PURPOSE 90 

X.  DETERMINISM  AND  FREEDOM 96 

XI.  THE  VERDICT  OF  THE  INFINITE  ....  105 


IMMORTALITY   AND   THE 
NEW   THEODICY 


Conditions  of  the  Discussion 

HE  first  note  in  Plato's  discussion 
of  immortality  in  the  "  Phaedo  " 
is  the  interest  expressed  in  the 
personal  bearing  of  Socrates  face  to  face 
with  death.  The  question  is  put  at  the 
start,  "And  how  did  he  die?"  The 
answer  to  this  quesjtion  constitutes  the 
lengthened  charm  of  the  opening  and 
the  pathos  and  majesty  of  the  closing 
chapters  of  the  immortal  dialogue.  Read- 
ers of  great  literature,  no  less  than  those 
who  bring  their  humanity  with  them  to 
the  consideration  of  the  ultimate  mean- 
ing of  existence,  will  be  slow  to  surrender 
these  memorials  of  one  of  the  strongest 


2  Conditions  of  the  Discussion 

and  best  of  men,  or  to  conclude  that  they 
are  in  the  way  of  the  argument.  In 
Plato's  hands  the  personal  interest  is  pres- 
ent as  motive  to  the  philosophical  en- 
deavor ;  it  is  there  as  background,  and  as 
atmosphere  to  the  strenuous  picture.  He 
employs  it  as  introduction,  recalls  it  from 
time  to  time  in  the  course  of  the  argu- 
ment, and  returns  to  it  at  the  end,  always 
in  the  service  of  the  strictly  rational  con- 
sideration of  his  problem.  In  the  strength 
of  passionate  desire  to  learn  of  the  bearing 
of  a  great  man  confronted  by  death,  the 
profound  thinker  moves  out  upon  his  in- 
comparable discussion.  And  all  those  who 
hope  to  win  even  the  slightest  attention 
to  their  words  upon  this  subject  must  here 
follow  his  example.  They  must  bring  their 
humanity  into  the  field  ;  as  men  they  must 
come  to  the  grand  debate.  The  sense  of 
death  as  a  sore  and  solemn  trial  is  almost 
universal,  and  those  who,  like  Cromwell 
and  Agricola,  Paul  and  Socrates,  lift  it  to 
the  levels  of  moral  grandeur,  inspire  a  rev- 


Conditions  of  the  Discussion  3 

erential  satisfaction  that  cannot  be  meas- 
ured. In  their  various  ways  they  flood 
death  with  their  humanity  ;  they  keep  the 
problem  which  it  raises  a  human  problem, 
and  thus  create  heart  and  hope  for  the  in- 
tellectual wrestle  with  it.  The  multitudes 
continue  to  linger  about  the  cross  because 
of  the  sublimity  of  the  personal  bearing  of 
Christ  in  death,  and  because  they  believe 
that  he  is  humanity's  best  representative. 
It  is  through  this  deep  and  abiding  inter- 
est in  the  fortune  of  men  that  the  advance 
is  made  to  the  present  argument.  This 
passion  of  humanity,  in  which  peasant  and 
philosopher  alike  share,  may  be  relied  upon 
now,  as  when  Socrates  drank  the  hemlock, 
to  sharpen  the  intellect  for  its  task,  to  fill 
it  with  the  incorruptible  love  of  truth,  and 
to  hold  it  with  patient  wisdom  to  its  best 
endeavor. 

In  any  profitable  consideration  of  the 
immortality  of  man,  it  is  essential  that  the 
limits  be  determined  within  which  the  dis- 
cussion must  move.  What  to  expect  upon 


4  Conditions  of  the  Discussion 

a  subject  like  this  is  half  the  battle.  One 
must  surrender  at  the  start  all  hope  of 
demonstration.  But,  then,  absolute  proof 
or  demonstration  is  possible  of  a  very 
small  part  of  what  is  universally  received 
as  knowledge.  It  is  clearly  impossible  to 
demonstrate  the  facts  of  history.  At  best 
they  must  be  accepted  on  the  testimony  of 
witnesses ;  and  even  when  the  testimony 
is  sifted  by  experts,  the  belief  to  which  it 
leads  is  not  grounded  upon  complete  proof, 
but  upon  the  capacity  and  integrity  of  the 
men  from  whom  it  came.  The  monu- 
mental record  of  Thucydides  is  universally 
accepted  as  true,  not  because  his  facts 
have  been  independently  verified,  but  be- 
cause of  the  confidence  reposed  in  the  his- 
torian. Nobody  who  appreciates  the  value 
of  words  pretends  that  the  doctrine  of 
evolution,  which  has  become  the  work- 
ing hypothesis  of  the  intellectual  world,  is 
demonstrated.  That  would  involve  an  ex- 
haustive knowledge  of  the  cosmos  and  its 
total  history.  Until  man  becomes  omnis- 


Conditions  of  the  Discussion  5 

cient,  the  conception  of  development  as 
giving  the  sole  method  by  which  the  Crea- 
tor works  in  space  and  time  must  remain 
incapable  of  complete  attestation.  No  clear 
thinker  will  claim  that  the  uniformity  of 
nature  is  an  idea  established  by  induction. 
The  induction  would  have  to  be  as  wide 
as  cosmic  history,  it  would  have  to  be  made 
by  men  as  old  as  history,  and  to  contempo- 
raries of  the  same  universal  reach  of  life, 
in  order  for  the  doctrine  of  the  uniformity 
of  nature  to  stand,  even  as  regards  the 
past,  upon  the  ground  of  demonstration. 
Suns  rise  and  set,  moons  wax  and  wane, 
tides  ebb  and  flow,  seasons  come  and  pass 
away,  day  and  night  follow  each  other  in 
unbroken  and  impressive  succession  ;  and 
from  the  limited  observation  which  we  and 
our  contemporaries  are  able  to  make,  we 
conclude  that  this  has  been  the  invariable 
order  from  the  beginning,  and  that  it  will 
continue  to  be  the  invariable  order  to  the 
end.  But  the  conclusion  is  a  tremendous 
assumption,  and  if  we  can  hold  no  beliefs 


6  Conditions  of  the  Discussion 

that  are  incapable  of  complete  logical  justi- 
fication, we  must  surrender  this  and  hun- 
dreds like  it  that  are  part  of  the  substance 
of  our  solidest  thinking.  The  remark  of 
one  traveler  to  another,  on  taking  a  last 
look  at  Mont  Blanc  before  leaving  Cha- 
mounix,  "  It  appears  as  if  it  would  stay 
there  until  we  come  back,"  exactly  ex- 
presses the  feeling  toward  the  essential 
and  indemonstrable  assumptions  of  sci- 
ence. Upon  the  largest  and  best  thought 
they  inspire  confidence  in  their  validity, 
and  nothing  more  can  be  said  for  them,  or 
need  be. 

The  belief  in  immortality  is  not,  there- 
fore, excluded  from  a  legitimate  place  in 
human  thought  because  it  does  not  admit 
of  demonstration.  It  is  a  future  event, 
and  as  such  cannot  be  proved.  Even  if 
the  reports  of  the  spiritist  are  accepted 
as  authentic,  still  the  fact  that  some  men 
have  survived  death  does  not  prove  that 
all  men  must.  A  flock  of  sheep  come  to 
a  river.  A  number  of  them  swim  safely 


Conditions  of  tbe  Discussion  7 

across,  and  bleat  to  their  brethren  behind, 
telling  them  as  plainly  as  can  be  that 
they  still  live  ;  nevertheless  the  sheep  who 
have  not  yet  tried  the  river  seem  a  good 
deal  excited.  The  question  with  them  is 
not  whether  others  have  survived  the 
wash  and  beat  of  the  stream,  but  whether 
they  shall  survive.  That  is  not  proved, 
and  in  the  nature  of  the  case  cannot  be. 
An  intelligent  member  of  the  flock,  hav- 
ing known  the  weakness  of  many  of  its 
brethren  who  report  that  they  have  safely 
crossed  the  flood,  and  wisely  judging  its 
own  superior  strength,  might  feel  comfort- 
ably sure  of  survival.  Spiritism,  even  if 
accepted  as  authentic,  cannot  yield  demon- 
stration. It  still  leaves  those  who  have 
not  tasted  death  in  the  sphere  of  moral 
faith.  It  may  be  admitted  that  if  certain 
of  its  survivals  were  attested,  it  would 
practically  remove  all  ground  of  fear  for 
even  the  weakest  among  the  living.  The 
point  to  be  observed,  however,  is  that 
human  immortality  is  incapable  of  demon- 


8  Conditions  of  the  Discussion 

stration,  that  absolute  logical  justification 
upon  such  a  subject  is  impossible  and 
even  inconceivable.  The  discussion  must 
therefore  move  in  another  sphere.  Men 
must  moderate  their  intellectual  expecta- 
tions, and  be  prepared  to  act  here,  as 
they  do  elsewhere,  upon  differing  degrees 
of  moral  consideration.  If  the  Eternal 
should  speak,  as  millions  of  our  fellow- 
men  believe  that  he  has  spoken,  upon  this 
question,  the  acceptance  of  his  word  would 
not  be  repose  in  a  demonstration,  but 
confidence  in  the  Divine  speaker.  Even 
on  the  part  of  those  who  accept  it,  the 
profoundest  appeal  of  the  resurrection 
of  Jesus  Christ  is  to  moral  confidence : 
"  Because  I  live,  ye  shall  live  also."  l 

1  John  xiv.  19. 


II 

Signs  of  Hope 

[HE  prevailing  mood  upon  this 
question  of  a  future  life  among 
wise  men  is  full  of  serious  in- 
terest and  hope.  Generally  it  is  one  of 
prophetic  silence.  The  oracles  are  dumb 
because  they  are  under  Bacon's  command 
to  weigh  and  consider.  The  old  argu- 
ments, the  venerable  certainties,  the  tra- 
ditional repose,  are  broken  up,  and  again 
those  who  walk  by  faith  are  face  to  face 
with  the  ultimate  order  of  the  universe. 
It  is  always  a  good  sign  when  men  are  "  in 
mute  dialogue  with  death,  judgment,  and 
eternity."  Those  who  to-day  are  profound 
believers  have  come  out  of  great  tribula- 
tion ;  they  have  won  their  faith  through 
victorious  insight  ;  they  feel  that  they 
have  seen  God  face  to  face,  and  that  in 


io  Signs  of  Hope 

consequence  their  life  is  preserved.  Those 
who  doubt  nobly,  for  the  most  part,  doubt 
in  hope.  Thus  the  wise  and  governing 
mind,  the  mind  that  shapes  the  spiritual 
habit  of  the  generation  whose  servant  it  is, 
is  once  more  in  movement  upon  this  ques- 
tion of  life  after  death.  It  is,  as  has  been 
said,  a  prophetic  hour.  The  oracles  are 
dumb,  not  because  they  have  nothing  to 
say,  but  because  they  are  preparing  for  a 
new  apocalypse.  The  sense  of  difficulty  is 
compelling  silence ;  and  golden  silence  is 
preceding  golden  speech.  The  oracles  are 
dumb,  not  because  the  priest  is  dead,  but 
because  he  is  waiting  for  the  new  wisdom 
to  gather  in  his  heart,  and  form  itself  into 
a  fresh  and  mightier  message  to  the  wor- 
shiper. 

There  is  doubtless  among  us  the  mood 
of  Swift,  the  mood  of  misery,  contempt, 
and  scorn.  There  are  those  who  sympa- 
thize with  him  when  they  see  him  paint- 
ing his  awful  picture  of  the  Struldbrugs, 
making  the  flesh  creep  over  the  horror  of 


Signs  of  Hope  1 1 

perpetual  existence,  inciting  the  heart  to 
pray  for  the  boon  of  self-forgetfulness, 
changing  hope  to  fear,  and  lifting  the 
light  from  the  human  ideal  of  endless  life 
which  it  has  hitherto  glorified  to  the  grim 
rest  of  absolute  unconsciousness.  But 
never  as  now  was  scorn  so  widely  discred- 
ited as  the  key  to  the  mystery  of  our 
being.  Omar  Khayyam  still  has  his  disci- 
ples. His  light-hearted  mockery,  ghastly 
humor,  and  gay  assurance  of  the  empti- 
ness of  existence  are  to  certain  moral 
types  contagious. 

"  Myself  when  young  did  eagerly  frequent 
Doctor  and  saint,  and  heard  great  argument, 
About  it  and  about ;  but  evermore 
Came  out  by  the  same  door  wherein  I  went. 

"  With  them  the  seed  of  wisdom  I  did  sow 

And  with  mine  own  hand  wrought  to  make  it  grow, 
And  this  was  all  the  harvest  that  I  reap'd, 
I  came  like  water  and  like  wind  I  go. 

"  The  revelations  of  devout  and  learned 
Who  rose  before  us,  and  as  prophets  burn'd, 


12  Signs  of  Hope 

Are  all  but  stories,  which,  awoke  from  sleep, 
They  told  their  comrades,  and  to  sleep  returned." 

Still  mirth,  mockery,  and  dogmatism  are 
not  the  method  of  the  scientific  spirit. 
Nor  was  there  ever  a  time  when  they  could 
be  described  with  less  truth  as  the  ac- 
cepted path  to  salvation. 

The  settled  despair,  the  consistent  and 
perfected  pessimism  of  "The  City  of  Dread- 
ful Night,"  is  too  tremendous  for  the  mob 
of  unbelievers  ;  and  while  many  an  heir  of 
faith  has  to  pass  through  this  desert  to  his 
spiritual  patrimony,  it  is  the  final  abode  of 
but  few.  The  number  is  small  of  those 
who  are  permanently  paralyzed  with 

"The  sense  that  every  struggle  brings  defeat 

Because  Fate  holds  no  prize  to  crown  success ; 
That  all  the  oracles  are  dumb  or  cheat, 

Because  they  have  no  secret  to  express  ; 
That  none  can  pierce  the  vast  black  veil  uncertain 
Because  there  is  no  light  behind  the  curtain ; 
That  all  is  vanity  and  nothingness." 

Beyond  all  these  is  the  Miltonic  mood  as 
given  in  the  great  Ode  on  the  Nativity. 
The  faith  that  has  been  is  discredited,  for 


Signs  of  Hope  1 3 

the  reason  that  it  stands  in  the  presence 
of  the  faith  that  is  to  be. 

"  Apollo  from  his  shrine 
Can  no  more  divine  " 

because  of  the  advent  of  a  sublimer  revela- 
tion. Old  things  are  passed  away  in  the 
sense  that  all  things  have  become  new. 
Many  are  the  believers  who  to-day  feel 
themselves  compelled  to  raise  the  deepest 
questions,  forced  back  until  they  stand 
face  to  face  with  the  ultimate  realities, 
driven  to  a  new  and  tremendous  wrestle 
with  destiny,  from  whom  the  old  certain- 
ties have  been  taken  away,  that  once  more 
they  may  think,  and  out  of  victorious 
thought  discover  the  solider  ground  for 
the  ineradicable  faith.  The  discipline  of 
doubt  is  indispensable  to  the  growing  in- 
sight of  mankind ;  and  whenever,  as  to-day, 
and  particularly  upon  the  question  of  the 
future  life,  the  sense  of  difficulty  induces 
silence  and  profounder  meditation,  a  pro- 
phetic hour  has  arrived.  The  deeper  in- 


14  Signs  of  Hope 

sight  will  gradually  perfect  itself,  and  once 
again  break  upon  the  world  in  song, 

"  Such  music  as  't  is  said 
Before  was  never  made, 

But  when  of  old  the  sons  of  morning  sung, 
While  the  Creator  great 
His  constellations  set, 

And  the  well-balanced  world  on  hinges  hung, 
And  cast  the  dark  foundations  deep, 
And  bid  the  weltering  waves  their  oozy  channel  keep." 

The  moods  of  pessimism  come  and  go  ; 
they  are  like  the  fresh  outbreaks  of  a 
plague.  While  humanity  is  never  secure 
against  them,  they  do  not  abide,  and  it 
may  be  hoped  that,  with  better  intellectual 
sanitation  and  robuster  character,  they  will 
finally  disappear.  At  any  rate,  they  are 
abnormal  and  cannot  endure.  The  histo- 
rian of  thought  knows  that  they  are  tran- 
sient even  when  they  persist  through  an 
entire  generation.  And  we  must  return 
to  the  ultimate  fact  that  the  permanent  in 
thought,  the  everlasting  in  belief,  is  the 
fabrication  of  the  spirits  in  whom  normal 
humanity  is  sovereign.  Imagine  an  insect 


Signs  of  Hope  15 

of  an  hour's  life  born  under  the  blackness 
of  a  thunder-cloud.  What  must  needs  be 
its  philosophy  of  the  universe  !  The  uni- 
verse is  going  to  wreck ;  in  this  state  of 
affairs  it  was  born  with  multitudinous  com- 
panions, and  it  dies  with  all  things  march- 
ing on  to  the  apparently  fatal  catastrophe. 
Men  know  that  it  is  otherwise  in  this  im- 
aginary instance,  and  yet  they  expand 
insignificant  moods  until  they  blot  the  sun 
out  of  heaven ;  they  elaborate  abnormal 
and  passing  phases  of  thought  until  they 
seem  to  darken  the  universe  ;  they  see 
the  thunder-cloud  and  believe  it  to  be  the 
sign  of  doom. 


Ill 

The  Deeper  Issues  of  the  Debate 

HE  new  prophetic  mood  to  which 
reference  has  been  made  has  al- 
ready begun  to  utter  itself  in  the 
clearer  appreciation  of  the  deeper  issues 
of  the  grand  debate.  The  problem  is,  of 
course,  the  permanence  of  the  human  per- 
sonality, the  continuance  of  the  soul  after 
death,  in  the  possession  of  memory,  reason, 
and  self-conscious  life.  But  this  problem 
states  itself  as  never  before.  It  is  no 
longer,  as  with  the  ancient  world,  a  ques- 
tion of  more  or  less  of  sensuous  existence  ; 
nor,  as  with  times  that  in  comparison  may 
be  termed  recent,  a  matter  relating  mainly 
to  the  gratification  or  disappointment  of 
human  desire.  It  is  a  duel  between  two 
contrasted  philosophies  of  man's  existence, 
between  universal  reason  and  its  opposite, 


The  Deeper  Issues  of  the  Debate      17 

between  a  noble  optimism  and  an  absolute 
pessimism.  Are  man's  rational  world  and 
God's  at  heart  coincident  and  concordant  ? 
Is  the  sphere  in  which  human  beings  live, 
and  which  they  seek  to  bring  under  the 
forms  of  reasonable  thought  and  lofty 
morality,  a  harmonious  part  of  the  uni- 
verse ?  Are  the  realms  of  the  human  and 
the  Infinite  capable  of  reconciliation,  or 
are  they  in  hopeless  hostility  ?  These  are 
the  issues  involved.  The  question  of  the 
immortality  of  man  is  nothing  less  than 
the  question  of  the  reality  of  man's  world, 
its  integrity  and  worth  for  the  universe. 
And  this  means  simply  the  ultimate  rea- 
sonableness or  unreasonableness,  the  intel- 
ligence or  brutality,  of  the  Power  that  is 
responsible  for  our  existence.  The  debate 
thus  involves,  at  the  outset,  the  life  of  rea- 
son, the  reality  of  thought,  the  existence  of 
an  intelligible  universe.  This  planet  is 
surrounded  by  the  stellar  spaces,  and  the 
denial  of  immortality  may  be  figured  by 
the  thought  that  the  sky  constitutes  a  fixed 


1 8  The  Deeper  Issues  of  the  Debate 
barrier,  a  wall  inside  of  which  men  live  and 
think,  but  beyond  which  exists  nothing  for 
them.  In  that  outside  realm  there  are  no 
correspondences  to  this  in  which  they  live  ; 
reason  and  right  with  them  are  not  reason 
and  right  with  it.  Between  the  circle 
within  the  wall  and  that  beyond  it,  there 
is  no  continuity,  no  sympathy,  no  relation 
except  one  of  dead  antagonism.  The  rights 
of  thought,  the  significance  of  conscience, 
the  meaning  of  our  human  world,  reach 
only  to  the  walls,  and  over  that  barrier  the 
infinite  enemy  of  man  is  looking,  and  pre- 
paring an  invasion  that  shall  at  last  be  an 
utter  desolation.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
assertion  of  the  reality  of  a  future  life  may 
be  represented  by  the  fact  that  the  sky 
lifts  itself  as  one  rises  into  it,  recedes  be- 
fore one  into  ever  ampler  spaces,  as  contin- 
uous with  the  places  which  one  fills,  as 
concordant  with  the  earth  upon  which  one 
lives.  As  space  here  and  there  is  one,  one 
in  its  nature  and  in  its  laws,  so  thought  is 
thought',  and  right  is  right  in  time  and  in 


The  Deeper  Issues  of  the  Debate  19 
eternity,  with  man  and  with  God.  And 
the  fact  that  one  part  of  the  intelligible 
universe  is  under  the  government  of  reason 
and  righteousness  supports  the  faith  that 
the  whole  compass  of  being  is  pervaded 
by  a  Mind  that  is  creative  and  supreme. 
Thus  the  fundamental  issues  declare  them- 
selves. 

It  is  further  clear  that  the  denial  of  im- 
mortality, equally  with  the  affirmation  of  it, 
implies  a  faith.  Unbelief  is  belief  in  dis- 
guise. Negative  thought  is  implicitly  pos- 
itive thought  ;  for  whoever  denies  that  a 
given  thing  is  true  thereby  affirms  that  its 
opposite  is  true.  Denial  is  but  the  left 
hand  of  unbelief  ;  its  right  hand  constructs 
and  sustains  a  positive  creed.  Unbelief 
has  its  interpretation,  its  philosophy  of 
human  existence.  It  is  assumed  that  the 
material  organization,  the  body,  in  fact,  is 
the  main  thing,  its  preservation  and  repro- 
duction the  chief  end  of  life.  Intelligence 
is  not  supreme  but  secondary,  something 
called  into  existence  incidentally,  to  help 


2O       The  Deeper  Issues  of  the  Debate 

forward,  at  a  given  stage,  the  great  move- 
ment of  unconscious  life.  This  merely 
subsidiary  intelligence  is  allowed  to  amuse 
itself  with  the  idealisms  of  science,  art, 
morality,  politics,  philosophy,  and  religion, 
inspired  by  the  pleasures  that  support  phy- 
sical life  and  the  pains  that  destroy  it.  The 
conception  of  man  here  indicated  is  of  a 
being  wholly  terrestrial,  whose  thought  has 
value  only  for  his  kind,  whose  morality  has 
no  consequence  beyond  his  own  weal  or 
woe  and  that  of  his  fellows,  whose  art  is 
finite  and  whgse  religion  is  but  a  subjective 
dream.  As  it  is  impossible  for  man  to  get 
outside  the  attractive  forces  of  the  earth, 
to  lift  or  project  anything  beyond  terres- 
trial limits,  as  every  missile  fired,  every 
aerial  machine  floated,  however  high  it 
may  go,  is  forever  within  the  lines  that 
sooner  or  later  compel  return,  so  it  is  held 
that  human  thought,  character,  and  conse- 
quence are  under  similar  fixed  restrictions. 
The  home  of  our  bodies  is  the  home  of  our 
souls.  In  origin,  fortune,  and  destiny  they 


The  Deeper  Issues  of  the  Debate      21 

are  identical.  All  efforts  at  the  transcend- 
ence of  material  conditions  are  as  foolish 
as  the  dream  of  the  boy  that  he  may  some 
day  fly  his  kite  to  the  moon. 

The  ground  of  this  faith  of  the  unbe- 
liever will  come  up  for  consideration  pres- 
ently. Here  and  now  it  is  to  be  noted 
that  his  unbelief  is  a  faith  of  the  most  stu- 
pendous kind.  In  our  time  a  great  body 
of  literature  has  accumulated  that  prac- 
tically ignores  the  possible  transcendence 
of  the  human  spirit.1  Man  is  treated  by 
these  writers  as  beginning  and  ending  his 
existence  on  the  earth,  and  as  sustaining 
no  relations  that  go  beyond  the  seen  and 
the  temporal.  The  literature  in  question 
passes  under  the  general  name  of  agnosti- 
cism, but  it  is  aggressively  dogmatic  to  a 
degree.  If  reference  happens  to  be  made 
to  immortality  it  is  to  a  belief  that  has 

1  For  an  admirable  summary  of  this  literature  see 
the  first  chapter  of  Dr.  Van  Dyke's  The  Gospel  for  an 
Age  of  Doubt,  a  book  of  high  value  both  for  believers 
and  unbelievers. 


22       The  Deeper  Issues  of  the  Debate 

become  completely  incredible  ;  as  in 
George  Eliot's  wild  remark  about  the  in- 
conceivability of  God,  the  impossibility 
of  a  future  life,  and  the  absoluteness  of 
duty.  The  tacit  assumption  that  the  case 
is  hopeless  for  spiritual  faith,  and  that  the 
limitation  of  human  existence  to  this 
world  is  as  plain  as  day,  are  chief  corner- 
stones in  the  creed  of  the  so-called  agnos- 
tic. Under  the  pretense  of  intellectual 
humility  a  scheme  is  constructed  that 
denies  to  human  life  universal  signifi- 
cance, that  treats  all  faith  in  a  transcend- 
ent world  as  an  illusion.  The  formula, 
"  We  do  not  know,  and  therefore  we  can- 
not believe,"  is  but  a  beggar's  blanket,  and 
cannot  be  made  to  cover  the  case.  The 
logical  strategy  set  up  in  the  term  "agnos- 
ticism" is  too  weak  to  stand  against  the 
aggressive  frankness  of  its  apostle.  His 
true  name  is  not  agnostic ;  for  he  has 
constructed  a  definite  philosophy  of  life, 
and  his  negation  of  the  Infinite,  whether 
in  the  form  of  indifference  or  reasoned 


The  Deeper  Issues  of  the  Debate  2) 
opinion,  is  part  of  his  total  conception  of 
the  universe.  Huxley  is  a  type  of  the 
class  to  which  reference  is  made,  and  of 
him  it  must  be  said  that  he  is  as  sure  of 
cosmic  hostility  to  man  as  any  Hebrew 
prophet  ever  was  that  the  stars  in  their 
courses  fought  for  Israel ;  he  is  as  posi- 
tive and,  one  might  add,  as  enthusiastic  in 
his  faith  that  all  things  work  together  for 
evil  to  those  who  love,  as  Plato  and  Paul 
were  that  all  things  work  together  for 
good ;  and  it  is  clearly  possible  that  unbe- 
lief no  less  than  belief,  negative  thought 
as  well  as  positive,  may  be  a  mistake. 
Believers  have  been  of  late  so  frequently 
reminded  of  the  errancy  of  their  Bibles, 
the  fallibility  of  their  traditions,  and  the 
weakness  of  their  powers,  by  their  breth- 
ren of  the  negative  camp,  that  it  may  not 
be  out  of  place  to  return  the  compliment. 
In  view  of  the  aggressive  confidence  with 
which  these  apostles  of  the  materialistic 
creed  preach  their  faith,  it  may  not  be 
amiss  to  remind  them  of  Cromwell's  ad- 


24       The  Deeper  Issues  of  the  Debate 

vice  to  the  Scotch,  "  I  beseech  you,  in  the 
tender  mercies  of  the  Lord,  believe  it  pos- 
sible that  you  may  be  mistaken."  Every 
thinker  takes  his  life  in  his  hand,  the 
denier  no  less  than  the  affirmer.  Unbe- 
lief is  apt  to  pose  as  matter  of  fact  against 
theory,  as  science  against  faith  ;  but  the 
truth  is  that  the  universe  by  which  men 
are  confronted  is  a  reality  in  itself,  and 
all  thoughts  about  it,  whether  affirmative 
or  negative,  whether  described  as  belief  or 
unbelief,  are  essentially  of  the  nature  of 
faith.  Men  stand  equally  to  their  con- 
trasted interpretations  of  what  passes  be- 
fore them  ;  neither  believer  nor  unbeliever 
can  pretend  to  a  complete  induction  of  the 
facts,  nor  to  an  infallible  inference  from 
those  on  hand.  It  must  be  understood, 
therefore,  that  the  great  poem  of  Lucre- 
tius is  as  truly  the  creation  of  faith  as 
Dante's  Divine  Comedy.  Both  poets  look 
upon  the  same  universe  ;  they  are  specta- 
tors of  the  same  pageant,  and  from  what 
they  see  they  form  their  contrasted  judg- 


The  Deeper  Issues  of  the  Debate  25 
ments  of  what  is.  They  quarry  their  hos- 
tile faiths  from  the  same  rock,  and,  stand- 
ing by  them,  await  the  judgment  of  the 
Eternal. 


IV 

The  Evidence  for  the  Denial 

T  is  now  in  order  to  state  the 
main  evidence  upon  which  un- 
belief rests  its  conclusion  that 

i 

there  is  no  future  life  for  man.  This  re- 
calls the  problem,  the  survival  at  death  of 
the  essential  human  personality,  the  con- 
tinued conscious  life  of  the  soul  after  the 
dissolution  of  the  body.  To  this  position 
of  faith  it  is  objected  that  the  fortune  of 
both  soul  and  body  seems  identical.  The 
child  new  to  earth  and  sky  is  as  incapable 
mentally  as  it  is  physically.  The  growth 
of  the  physical  organization  is  accompa- 
nied, in  all  normal  cases,  with  a  corre- 
sponding mental  development.  This  pro- 
cess of  increase  is  coincident  to  maturity, 
and  in  decline  the  coincidence  is  equally 
plain.  Plato  at  seventy  cannot  think  and 


The  Evidence  for  the  Denial         27 

write  as  he  did  at  fifty ;  the  mind  that  pro- 
duced the  Laws  is  no  longer  the  genius 
that  created  the  Republic.  Bryant  ceased 
to  write  poetry  in  his  old  age,  and  took  to 
the  translation  of  Homer,  on  the  ground, 
as  he  says,  that  old  age  incapacitates  for 
creative  activity.  There  comes  a  day 
when  a  Gladstone  must  confess  that  he  is 
no  longer  equal  to  the  burden  of  political 
leadership,  when  a  Martineau  must  decline 
to  enter  upon  new  tasks.  John  Henry 
Newman  has  recorded  his  opinion  that 
after  seventy  severe  intellectual  exertion 
means  death.  And  indeed  this  participa- 
tion of  both  body  and  mind  in  a  common 
fortune  is  undeniable.  The  helplessness 
of  infancy,  the  vigor  of  youth,  the  power 
of  manhood,  and  the  decline  of  old  age 
extend  to  the  total  expression  of  man's 
life.  There  is,  as  Aristotle  says,  an  old 
age  of  the  mind,  as  well  as  of  the  body.1 

In  addition  to  this  common  fortune  in 
which  the  spiritual  and  physical  parts  of 
1  Pol.  ii.  9,  23. 


28         The  Evidence  for  the  Denial 

man's  being  are  involved,  it  is  observed 
that  for  every  change  in  the  bodily  organi- 
zation there  is  a  corresponding  change  in 
the  soul ;  that  affections  of  the  nervous 
system  lead  invariably  to  modifications  in 
thought  and  feeling,  and  that  ideas  and 
volitions  originating  in  the  mind  are  at 
once  expressed  in  terms  of  bodily  activity 
and  power.  The  relation  is  continuous 
from  the  first  signs  of  consciousness  to 
the  last,  and  it  is  of  the  most  intimate 
and  ineffable  character.  True,  the  same 
science  that  takes  our  profound  practical 
experience  of  the  marvelous  intimacy  of 
body  and  soul,  and  works  it  over  into  the 
established  opinion  that  changes  in  the 
one  are  invariably  accompanied  by  changes 
in  the  other,  tells  us,  with  the  utmost  can- 
dor and  emphasis,  that  the  concurrent  ac- 
tivities are,  so  far  as  has  been  observed, 
only  concurrent.  They  are  utterly  un- 
translatable the  one  into  the  other.  No 
wise  disputant  upon  this  subject  will  be 
disposed  to  quarrel  with  the  statements  of 


The  Evidence  for  the  Denial         29 

science  as  to  the  intimacy  of  body  and 
mind.  Self-observation  and  reflection  give 
one  a  far  profounder  sense  of  that  inti- 
macy than  any  experiment  conducted  upon 
another  can.  So  long  as  the  activities  of 
body  and  mind  are  not  held  to  be  identi- 
cal, it  is  impossible  to  overstate  the  inti- 
macy. Every  exposition  of  the  unsearch- 
able closeness  of  the  human  spirit  to  the 
physical  organization  which  it  fills  but 
serves  to  make  one  aware  of  the  mysteri- 
ous order  of  man's  life.  No  believer  in 
the  unity  and  permanence  of  the  soul  need 
question,  no  believer  can  question,  the 
soundness  of  Aristotle's  statement,  that 
mind  is  the  perfection  of  the  body  as  sight 
is  the  perfection  of  the  eye.1  No  com- 
parison less  strong  and  extreme  can  ade- 
quately express  the  truly  ineffable  relation 
between  the  inward  man  and  the  outward. 

1  De  Anima,  ii.  i,  g.  This  comparison  Aristotle  does 
not  extend  to  the  creative  reason,  that  in  man  which 
makes  him  a  thinking  being.  An  adequate  modern 
exposition  of  the  great  thinker  at  this  point  would  be 
of  extreme  interest 


^o          The  Evidence  for  the  Denial 

Organization,  then,  is  essential  to  the 
expression  of  mind  ;  to  the  unbeliever  it 
seems  essential  to  the  existence  of  mind. 
For  it  we  wait  in  the  darkness  of  the 
prenatal  state,  for  it  we  linger  in  the  incapa- 
ble wonder  of  infancy ;  and  when  in  youth 
and  manhood  it  is  ours,  we  feel  as  if  with 
its  development  we  had  found  ourselves. 
Then  the  turn  comes,  and  the  bodily  organ- 
ization declines.  Sight  grows  dim,  hear- 
ing becomes  thick,  taste  indifferent,  and 
all  the  vital  powers  begin  to  live  beyond 
their  income.  Bankruptcy  comes  at  last, 
and  with  the  failure  of  heart  and  flesh  the 
last  ray  of  intelligence  vanishes.  The  fact 
would  seem  to  be,  so  it  is  held,  that  not 
only  is  organization  essential  to  mind, 
but  also  that  this  particular  organization, 
this  present  body,  is  essential.  Transfer 
from  the  earthly  house  of  this  tabernacle 
to  the  house  not  made  with  hands,  eternal 
in  the  heavens,  would  appear  to  be  an  im- 
possibility. Thus  it  comes  to  pass  that 
from  identity  of  fortune  throughout  life, 


The  Evidence  for  the  Denial         31 

from  coincidence  of  activity,  and  from  the 
manifest  dependence  of  the  mind  upon 
the  material  organism  for  the  expression 
of  its  power,  it  is  assumed,  or  concluded, 
that  the  dissolution  of  the  body  is  the 
extinction  of  the  soul.  It  is,  finally,  the 
apparent  indispensableness  to  mental  life 
of  the  particular  organization  that  we  call 
a  man's  body,  that  makes  it  impossible  for 
so  many  to  believe  in  the  immortality  of 
the  soul.  The  famous  remark,  attributed 
to  Socrates,  "  God  may  forgive  sin,  but  I 
do  not  see  how  he  can,"  is  not  strong 
enough  to  serve  the  purposes  of  negative 
thought  upon  this  question.  It  is  admitted 
that  the  Creative  Power  may  be  able  to 
secure  the  survival  of  the  soul  after  the 
brain  has  become  fixed  in  death,  but  the 
difficulty  of  so  thinking  is  held  to  be  so 
great  that  the  only  reasonable  conclusion 
is  its  practical  impossibility. 


Value  of  the  Evidence  for  Denial 

T  now  becomes  necessary  to  review 
the  evidence  presented  for  the 
belief  that  the  soul  cannot  sur- 
vive the  death  of  the  body.  And  as  a 
preliminary,  it  should  be  remarked  that 
the  difficulty  of  seeing  through  the  case  to 
a  positive  faith  is  precisely  what  consti- 
tutes it  a  problem.  If  there  were  no  coin- 
cident growth  and  decline  of  mind  and 
body,  no  interdependence,  no  community 
of  fortune,  and  no  close  and  unsearcha- 
ble connection  between  them,  there  would 
be  no  problem.  The  statement  of  these 
admitted  facts  is  only,  as  the  lawyers  say, 
the  putting  in  of  the  case.  Argument 
is  deferred,  interpretation  and  judgment 
come  later.  Whenever,  therefore,  the 
facts  previously  enumerated  about  the  in- 


Value  of  the  Evidence  for  Denial     33 

terrelation  of  the  soul  and  the  body  ap- 
pear conclusive  against  hope,  it  must  be 
borne  in  mind  that  this  is  simply  prejudg- 
ment.  The  sense  of  difficulty  created  by 
the  facts  merely  means,  in  the  first  in- 
stance, that  faith  in  immortality  has  be- 
come a  problem.  If  there  were  no  dark 
and  distressing  side  to  human  existence,  if 
there  were  no  difficulties  in  the  way  of 
belief,  there  would  be  no  room  for  debate. 
But  if  some  subtraction  must  be  made 
from  the  apparent  weight  of  evidence 
against  hope,  on  the  ground  that  only  thus 
is  the  question  raised  to  serious  impor- 
tance, a  further  and  perhaps  larger  deduc- 
tion is  necessary,  owing  to  the  activity  in 
the  matter  of  sense  and  imagination.  The 
blow  on  the  head  which  is  followed  by  in- 
stantaneous loss  of  mental  expression,  the 
whiff  of  ether  that  carries  the  patient  into 
apparent  absolute  insensibility,  the  acci- 
dent that  turns  the  man  of  genius  into  an 
imbecile  for  the  remainder  of  his  days,  the 
slow  decay  of  the  physical  frame,  and  the 


34      Value  of  the  Evidence  for  Denial 

corresponding  disappearance  of  intellectual 
power,  mightily  affect  feeling.  The  senses 
take  in  such  situations  with  abnormal  in- 
tensity. The  impression,  powerful  at  the 
time,  becomes  a  permanent  memory ;  and 
the  tragic  poet,  implicit  in  every  man,  here 
finds  the  suitable  and  stimulating  material 
for  the  construction  of  the  lurid  drama 
that,  after  life's  fitful  fever,  lays  the  weary 
and  heavy  laden  to  rest  in  the  dreamless 
and  eternal  slumber  of  the  grave.  Men 
still  fear  death  as  children  fear  to  go  into 
the  dark.  The  impression  upon  the  sensi- 
bility is  inevitable,  and  at  first  imagination 
is  but  the  slave  of  sense.  There  is  no 
moral  blame  in  the  matter  ;  nor  is  there 
any  immediate  and  universal  remedy.  The 
sensuous  feelings  are  slow  to  surrender ; 
they  are  dull  scholars ;  they  hold  out 
against  truth,  not,  indeed  forever,  but  for 
a  long  time.  The  thing  to  be  noted,  how- 
ever, is  that  in  these  feelings  there  is  no 
argument  against  immortality,  nor  do  they 
imply  any  real  application  of  reason  to  the 


Value  of  the  Evidence  for  Denial     35 

problem.  To  dispose  of  the  question  by 
feeling  and  imagination  is  to  fail  to  carry 
it  to  the  only  satisfactory  tribunal.  At 
no  time  is  Butler  stronger  than  when  he 
contends  that  the  influence  of  imagina- 
tion, more  than  anything  else,  makes  men 
torture  death  into  the  destruction  of  the 
human  spirit. 

To  this  must  be  added,  as  far  as  the 
senses  are  concerned,  the  unobviousness 
of  the  other  side.  The  psalmist  said  that 
he  cried  unto  God  out  of  the  depths,  and 
that  God  heard  him.  Nowhere  but  in  the 
depths  can  the  fundamental  truths  of  the 
world  be  found.  If  men,  in  the  mass,  are 
incapable  of  profound  thinking,  profound 
living  is  open  to  all ;  and  in  the  unobvious 
realms  below  the  surface  the  great  discov- 
eries are  made,  and  nowhere  else.  The 
process  of  knowledge  that  testifies  so 
mightily  to  the  unity  of  the  mind  is  subtle 
and  many  miss  it.  The  value  of  the  ideal 
is  not  quoted  in  the  markets  of  the  world, 
and  multitudes  remain  insensible  to  it. 


$6     Value  of  the  Evidence  for  Denial 

The  ethical  illumination  of  experience  and 
the  moral  trend  of  history  are  not  obvious 
truths,  and  so  are  unacknowledged  by  vast 
numbers  of  the  race.  The  capacity  of 
man  for  fellowship  with  the  Infinite  and 
the  philosophy  of  the  religious  life  are 
matters  not  for  sensational  impression,  but 
for  thought ;  and,  in  a  word,  the  kingdom 
of  heaven,  that  institute  of  the  Eternal 
Spirit  which  includes  the  ideals,  the  values, 
the  fellowships,  and  the  hopes  of  humanity 
at  its  best  and  in  its  highest  interpreta- 
tion, does  not  come  with  observation.  The 
evidence  for  man's  immortality  is  not  in 
the  earthquake,  nor  in  the  tempest,  nor  in 
the  fire,  but  in  the  still  small  voice.  And 
upon  the  world  at  large,  which  is  very 
hard  of  hearing,  that  voice  has  but  little 
power.  If  it  were  possible,  which  it  is  not, 
to  make  the  considerations  that  support 
belief  in  the  endless  life  of  the  soul  as 
obvious  as  the  impressions  of  sense  and  as 
palpable  as  the  repetition  of  the  lurid  and 
terrible  in  imagination,  it  is  believed  that 


Value  of  tbe  Evidence  for  Denial     37 

they  would  absolutely  control  the  convic- 
tion of  mankind.  So  accessible  to  dramatic 
situation  and  coloring  are  the  majority  of 
men,  and  so  insensible  to  thought. 

We  come  now  to  the  final  question  be- 
tween belief  and  unbelief.  What  is  the 
nature  of  the  organization  upon  which  the 
mind  is  said  to  be  completely  dependent  ? 
Professor  Goldwin  Smith  assumes  that  it 
is  now  clear  that  the  soul  is  not  a  unity 
in  itself,  but  the  name  for  the  higher  and 
finer  activity  "of  our  general  frame."1 
Upon  a  momentous  question  it  is  not  alto- 
gether satisfactory  to  think  like  a  philoso- 
pher with  one  lobe  of  the  brain,  and  like 
the  vulgar  with  the  other.  Like  a  philo- 
sopher Professor  Smith  tells  us  what  the 
soul  is.  It  is  "  the  higher  and  finer  activ- 
ity of  our  general  frame."  But  what  he 
means  by  the  phrase  "  our  general  frame  " 
he  does  not  say.  This,  however,  as  Berke- 
ley has  shown,  and  after  him  John  Stuart 
Mill,  and  every  other  thinker  who  has  gone 

1  The  Forum,  July,  1896,  p.  610. 


38      Value  of  the  Evidence  for  Denial 

to  the  heart  of  the  matter,  is  the  funda- 
mental question  at  issue.  And  if  one  is 
to  allow  the  great  thinkers  of  mankind  to 
mould  one's  general  thought  of  the  mate- 
rial universe,  one  cannot  but  be  influenced 
by  their  work  at  this  particular  point. 
Since  speculation  escaped  its  infancy,  the 
world  of  matter  has  been  generally  held  to 
be,  in  one  form  or  another,  an  idealism.  It 
is  everywhere  admitted  that  the  material 
universe  is  not  what  it  seems  to  be  to  the 
ordinary  mind.  In  the  process  of  analysis 
it  is  transformed  into  the  permanent  pos- 
sibility of  sensations  with  Mill,  into  the 
Unknowable  Power  with  Spencer,  into  the 
Infinite  Spirit  with  Berkeley,  and  into 
the  manifestation  of  the  Absolute  by  a 
whole  procession  of  German  thinkers.  If 
the  analysis  is  but  thorough  and  consistent 
and  intelligible,  everything  material  dis- 
solves at  last  in  the  Universal  Will,  as  the 
falling  snowflakes  melt  into  the  current  of 
the  stream.  Matter  becomes  the  popular 
name  for  force,  force  the  scientific  name 


of  the  Evidence  for  Denial      39 

for  will,  and  will  the  philosophical  explana- 
tion, guided  by  the  analogy  of  the  human 
personality,  of  the  universe  in  space  and 
time. 

a  surgeon  looks  in  upon  the 


brain  of  a  patient,  what  is  the  nature  of 
that  upon  which  he  looks  ?  He  sees  some- 
thing ;  he  can  touch  something  ;  he  can 
investigate  and  operate  upon  something. 
Popularly  it  is  understood  that  he  is  deal- 
ing with  a  substance  foreign  to  the  think- 
ing principle  within.  But  can  the  surgeon 
get  beyond  sight  and  touch  ?  Is  he  not 
investigating  and  operating  in  a  world  of 
mind  ?  And  can  he  say  anything  further 
of  the  object  before  him  than  that  it  gives 
rise  to  his  peculiar  mental  life  at  the  mo- 
ment, and  that  he  possesses  the  power  of 
inducing  modifications  in  it  ?  If  the  uni- 
versal matter  of  the  ordinary  mind  is  a 
myth,  the  material  body  is  a  myth.  The 
particular  specimen  of  the  outward  uni- 
verse, the  human  body,  must  follow  the 
example,  take  on  the  character,  and  share 


4O      Value  of  the  Evidence  far  Denial 

the  fate  of  the  whole.  It  seems  unaccount- 
able that  the  philosophy  which  derives  its 
life  from  Hume,  and  which  dissolves  the 
outward  world  into  a  series  of  sensations, 
should  erect  the  human  body,  which  is,  ac- 
cording to  the  theory,  but  a  given  speci- 
men of  that  world,  into  a  material  organism 
upon  whose  life  the  existence  of  the  soul 
is  wholly  dependent.  Thinking  of  this 
sort  is  either  the  mad  inconsistency  or 
the  base  hypocrisy  of  the  philosophy  in 
question. 

We  have  thus  seen  that  another  man's 
body  is  but  the  condition  of  sensational 
life  to  the  surgeon.  We  now  ask,  What  is 
the  surgeon's  body  to  himself  ?  It  cannot 
be  the  material  organism  of  the  ordinary 
mind,  for  material  organism  of  that  sort 
there  is  none  anywhere.  It  can  be  no 
other  than  a  form  of  mind,  an  attachment 
in  the  service  of  the  human  spirit  from  its 
Maker,  a  source  of  mental  nutrition,  an 
order  which  operates  as  receptivity  when 
spoken  to  from  without,  and  which  acts  as 


Value  of  the  Evidence  for  Denial     41 

the  medium  of  expression  when  addressed 
from  within.  The  body  is  thus  trans- 
formed into  an  order  of  feelings,  the  soul 
into  an  order  of  thought,  and  both  into  an 
order  of  mind.  Our  human  universe  is 
a  dualism.  It  is  composed  of  sense  and  of 
thought,  and  these  two  are  in  conjunction. 
The  universe  of  sense  has  its  law  and  ne- 
cessity, and  it  claims  the  order  of  sense 
that  constitutes  man's  body  as  its  subject ; 
the  universe  of  thought  has  its  character 
and  power,  and  it  claims  the  order  of 
thought  that  constitutes  the  soul  as  its 
servant.  The  deepest  account,  so  far  as 
it  appears,  that  any  man  can  give  of  his 
body  is  that  it  is  a  form  of  his  conscious- 
ness. It  enters  into  his  consciousness, 
conditions  it,  serves  it,  affects  it  in  a  thou- 
sand ways;  but  still  it  is  no  machine  in 
the  revolving  wheels  of  which  the  spirit  can 
alone  live.  It  is  a  form  of  his  personality 
that  comes  and  goes.  The  great  note  of 
the  sense-universe  to  which  the  body  be- 
longs is  change ;  the  great  mark  of  the 


4%      Value  of  the  Evidence  for  Denial 

personal  universe  is  permanence.  And, 
therefore,  it  may  well  be  that  the  body,  the 
sensuous  concomitant  of  the  spirit,  passes 
Utterly  away  at  what  is  called  death,  accord- 
ing to  the  law  of  its  order ;  and  that  ac- 
cording to  the  law  of  its  order  the  person- 
ality abides.  It  should  be  added  that  since 
it  is  the  sensational  philosophy  that  is  the 
usual  basis  for  the  denial  of  the  immortal- 
ity of  man,  inasmuch  as,  according  to  that 
philosophy,  there  is  no  necessary  connec- 
tion, no  causal  relation  between  the  series 
of  feelings  called  the  body  and  the  series 
called  the  soul,  a  mere  concomitance, 
however  striking,  a  bare  association  how- 
ever constant,  cannot  be  held  as  evidence 
that  the  spiritual  member  of  the  fellowship 
may  not  exist  when  the  other  member  has 
been  withdrawn.  How  clearly  John  Stuart 
Mill  saw  this  is  evident  from  these  words  : 
"The  relation  of  thought  to  a  material 
brain  is  no  metaphysical  necessity,  but 
simply  a  constant  coexistence  within  the 
limits  of  pbservation.  And  when  analyzed 


Value  of  the  Evidence  for  Denial      43 

to  the  bottom  .  .  .  the  brain,  just  as  much 
as  the  mental  functions,  is,  like  matter  it- 
self, merely  a  set  of  human  sensations 
either  actual  or  inferred  as  possible.  Expe- 
rience furnishes  us  with  no  examples  of 
any  series  of  states  of  consciousness  with- 
out this  group  of  contingent  sensations 
attached  to  it ;  but  it  is  as  easy  to  imagine 
such  a  series  of  states  without  as  with 
this  accompaniment,  and  we  know  of  no 
reason  in  the  nature  of  things  against  the 
possibility  of  its  being  disjoined."  l 

The  conclusion  to  which  one  would  seem 
to  be  forced  upon  this  question  of  organi- 
zation is  that  the  body  is  a  section  of  the 
total  human  consciousness,  that  it  is  a  sec- 
tion which  fluctuates  greatly  during  the  „ 
present  life,  and  that  as  an  inconstant  part 
of  the  personality  it  may  pass  utterly  away, 
and  still  leave  the  personality  itself  in  full 
vigor  and  open  to  new  and  superior  oppor- 
tunities. Science  can  show  nothing  more 
than  concurrence  of  activity  on  the  part 

1  Essays  on  Religion,  pp.  199,  200. 


44      Value  of  the  Evidence  for  Denial 

of  body  and  soul.  Human  life  is  a  chariot 
'drawn  by  two  horses,  and  when  one  drops 
it  does  not  follow  that  the  other  ceases  to 
exist.  Some  embarrassment  may  be  occa- 
sioned by  the  break,  and  some  delay ;  yet 
in  the  resources  of  the  universe  it  is  not 
hard  to  believe  that  another  mate  has  been 
provided,  in  anticipation  of  the  need.  At 
least,  nothing  in  the  known  relation  of  the 
mind  and  the  body  appears  to  contradict 
that  vast  and  inspiring  hope. 


VI 

Postulates  of  Immortality 

HE  denial  of  immortality  is  the 
creed  that  constructs  itself  out 
of  certain  aspects  of  human  life. 
Those  aspects  have  been  considered,  and 
it  has  appeared  that  the  facts  do  not  seem 
to  warrant  the  dismal  interpretation  put 
upon  them.  In  passing  now  from  the 
negative  side  to  the  positive,  from  a  re- 
view of  the  denial  to  a  consideration  of  the 
affirmation  of  man's  immortality,  it  must 
be  understood  that  we  are  going,  not  from 
science  to  faith,  but  from  one  form  of 
belief,  which  has  been  shown  to  be  prema- 
ture, to  another  which  is  held  to  be  valid, 
persistent,  and,  all  things  considered,  in- 
evitable. Since  science  is  dumb  upon  the 
question,  the  belief  in  immortality  seeks 
its  premise  from  philosophy.  The  con- 


46  Postulates  of  Immortality 

struction  of  that  premise  may  seem  to  de- 
lay unreasonably  the  conclusion,  but  the 
delay  is  not  really  unreasonable.  For  it  is 
only  as  an  inference  from  a  given  interpre- 
tation of  the  universe  that  belief  in  the 
future  life  can  defend  itself.  The  belief 
stands  or  falls  with  the  moral  idea  of  the 
universe.  That  idea  is  its  necessary  pre- 
supposition, and  that  idea  at  its  best  pro- 
vides the  strongest  foundations  for  hope. 
A  more  consistent  expression  than  has 
generally  prevailed  of  the  moral  concep- 
tion of  the  universal  order  under  which 
men  live  is  an  indispensable  preliminary 
in  this  discussion. 

The  three  grand  positions  from  which 
faith  in  a  hereafter  for  man  would  seem  to 
follow  are  the  moral  perfection  of  the  Cre- 
ator, the  reasonableness  of  the  universe, 
and  the  worth  of  human  life.  The  three 
are  at  heart  one  ;  for  if  the  first  is  true, 
if  God  is  absolutely  good,  the  other  two 
must  follow.  Still  a  few  words  upon  each 
one  of  the  three  may  tend  to  clearness. 


Postulates  of  Immortality  47 

That  a  Supreme  Mind  orders  and  gov- 
erns all  things  may  be  held  to  be  capable 
of  demonstration.  The  natural  and  sane 
operation  of  the  human  intellect  conducts 
irresistibly  to  this  conclusion.  It  is,  in- 
deed, impossible  to  survey  the  earth*  and 
the  heavens,  to  note  the  countless  orders 
of  life  below,  and  the  everlasting  march  of 
splendors  on  high ;  to  regard  the  uniform 
and  marvelous  operation  of  law  in  things 
the  least  significant,  and  in  things  the 
most  sublime  ;  to  behold  everywhere  the 
signs  of  unity,  individuals  running  into 
families,  families  into  societies,  societies 
into  kingdoms,  and  kingdoms  moving  to 
their  concordant  places  within  the  same 
circle  of  being ;  to  dwell  upon  the  evi- 
dence that  men  are  living,  not  in  a  chaos, 
but  in  a  cosmos,  not  amid  infinite  miscel- 
laneousness,  but  in  an  ordered  and  real 
universe  ;  —  it  is  impossible  to  allow  all 
these  judgments  their  legitimate  impres- 
sion upon  the  mind,  and  still  resist  the 
belief  in  a  supreme  and  all-controlling  In- 


48  Postulates  of  Immortality 

telligence.  When  Bacon  says  that  he 
would  rather  believe  all  the  fables  in  the 
Legend,  and  in  the  Talmud,  and  in  Alco- 
ran, than  that  this  universal  frame  is  with- 
out a  mind,  he  is  giving  expression  to  the 
scientific  understanding  ;  he  is  the  prophet 
of  the  sane  intellect  everywhere. 

It  cannot,  however,  be  maintained  that 
the  absolute  goodness  of  the  Creator  is 
demonstrable.  The  complete  induction  of 
the  facts  accessible  to  man  would  show 
wonderful  devices  for  joy  in  the  living 
world,  unimagined  sources  of  zest  even  in 
the  stern  side  of  existence,  and  amazing 
adjustments  in  man's  environment  for  the 
production  of  heroic  and  splendid  charac- 
ter. Still,  when  all  this  has  been  said, 
there  will  remain  a  large  residuum  of  un- 
accountable distress,  and,  what  is  more 
serious,  an  order  that  does  not  discrimi- 
nate between  the  just  and  the  unjust. 
The  converse  to  the  sublime  fact  that  God 
makes  his  sun  shine  upon  the  evil  and 
the  good,  and  his  rain  fall  upon  the  just 


Postulates  of  Immortality  49 

and  the  unjust,  is  supplied  in  the  famous 
line,  — 

"  Here 's  a  night 
That  pities  neither  wise  men  nor  fools." 

The  belief  in  the  absolute  goodness  of 
God  is  an  assumption,  an  assumption,  in- 
deed, without  which  men  cannot  live,  but 
still  an  assumption,  that  is,  a  belief  for 
which  there  is  proof,  but  not  demonstra- 
tive proof.  The  logical  impulse  impels  to 
this  belief,  for  thus  it  becomes  possible 
to  account  for  all  the  good  in  the  world, 
and  to  hope  for  a  good  issue  from  all  the 
apparent  evil.  The  disinterestedness  of 
a  Moses ;  the  passionate  devotion  of  an 
Isaiah ;  the  self-effacement  and  heroism  of 
a  Paul ;  the  reforming  zeal  and  courage  for 
righteousness  of  a  Luther;  the  burning 
love  of  the  saints  of  the  earth,  in  all  ages, 
among  all  peoples,  and  under  the  forms 
of  all  religions ;  the  moral  integrity,  the 
patient  endurance,  and  pious  humanity  of 
the  great  majority  of  those  by  whom  the 
world  has  been  kept  alive  and  carried  for- 


50  Postulates  of  Immortality 

ward,  and,  above  all,  with  us  in  this  part 
of  the  globe,  the  sublime  character  of 
Jesus  Christ,  compel  one  to  think  of  the 
Infinite  as  at  least  good  enough  to  ac- 
count for  this  amazing  total  of  human 
goodness.  For  it  is  certain  that  it  could 
not  have  originated  or  persisted  or  per- 
fected itself  against  the  purpose  or  with- 
out the  sympathy  of  the  Creator. 

One  is  also  guided  by  the  moral  impulse 
to  the  great  conclusion  that  God  must  be 
perfectly  good.  Men  thus  honor  the  deep- 
est and  most  venerable  instinct  in  the  hu- 
man heart. 

"  Shall  mortal  man  be  more  just  than  God  ? 
Shall  a  man  be  more  pure  than  his  Maker  ?  " 1 

Here  is  the  final  moral  incredibility.  Al- 
most as  strong  is  the  expression  of  Plato's 
ethical  passion,  "  God  is  in  no  way  what- 
ever unrighteous,  but  he  is  righteous  in 
the  Jiighest  possible  degree ;  and  nothing 
is  more  like  him  than  the  one  of  us  who 
shall  become  supremely  just." 2  It  is  a 

1  Job  iv.  17.  a  Thecet.  176  C. 


Postulates  of  Immortality  57 

reasonable  conscience  that  makes  cowards 
of  us  all.  One  of  the  aboriginal  and  inde- 
structible sentiments  of  humanity  speaks 
in  the  great  words,  — 

"  I  dare  do  all  that  may  become  a  man ; 
Who  dares  do  more  is  none." 

There  is  a  moral  law  or  instinct  in  man, 
inalienable  from  his  being,  which  he  can- 
not override  and  remain  man.  It  would 
seem  that  this  feeling  that  God  must  be 
wholly  good  should  remain  inviolable,  and 
that  it  should  be  ruler  among  all  human 
thoughts.  It  is  not  simply  the  religious 
impulse,  but  also  the  fundamental  ethical 
constitution  of  mankind  that  speaks  in 
Whittier's  faith,  — 

"  The  wrong  that  pains  my  soul  below, 
I  dare  not  throne  above." 

That  "dare  not,"  coming  as  it  does,  not 
from  the  basest  but  from  the  best  in  man, 
rightfully  and  mightily  supports  the  con- 
clusion that  God  is  good. 

The  necessities  of  worship  plead  for  the 


52  Postulates  of  Immortality 

same  thing.  The  mood  of  homage  to  the 
Eternal  is  confessedly  the  highest  in  man, 
and  it  is  plainly  impossible  for  intelligent 
man  unless  he  is  able  to  behold  in  God  ab- 
solute moral  perfection.  The  absoluteness 
of  devotion,  the  fervor  and  sublimity  of 
the  homage,  expressed  in  the  great  words, 
"Though  he  slay  me,  yet  will  I  trust  in 
him,"  is  unattainable  except  by  those  who 
are  forever  assured  of  the  perfect  integrity 
of  the  Divine  Being.  The  insight  obtained 
into  the  Divine  method  of  educating  the 
human  spirit,  through  the  higher  moods  of 
worship  and  the  confidences  established, 
all  flow  from  the  august  assumption  that 
the  soul  is  dealing  with  a  Being  of  utter 
rectitude  and  love.  The  logical  impulse 
that  finds  good  in  the  works  of  God's 
hands,  and  often,  as  in  the  moral  leaders  of 
mankind  and  in  the  Master  of  the  Chris- 
tian world,  immeasurable  good,  conducts  to 
faith ;  the  moral  instinct  that  holds  it  blas- 
phemy to  think  the  creature  juster  and 
purer  than  the  Creator  impels  yet  more 


Postulates  of  Immortality  53 

powerfully  to  the  same  conclusion  ;  finally, 
the  necessities  of  worship,  and  all  the  re- 
finement and  strength  that  come  to  man's 
spirit  by  means  of  it,  mightily  support  this 
belief. 

The  belief  in  the  moral  perfection  of 
God  is  an  assumption  for  which  there  is 
proof,  but  by  no  means  complete  proof. 
Its  deepest  justification  is  that  it  is  the  as- 
sumption without  which  human  life  cannot 
be  understood ;  without  which  the  ideals, 
the  higher  endeavors,  the  best  character 
and  hope  of  man,  are  unaccountable  and 
insane.  As  F.  D.  Maurice  said  a  genera- 
tion ago,  assume  the  answering  Reality  to 
the  first  words  of  the  Lord's  prayer,  "  Our 
Father,  who  art  in  heaven,"  and  the  total 
of  human  history  becomes  intelligible.  If 
scientific  suppositions  are  justified  by  the 
completeness  of  their  working,  so  here  the 
order  and  hope  that  flow  from  the  first  and 
sublimest  of  assumptions  would  seem  to 
be  a  vindication  that  cannot  be  impugned. 
And  it  need  hardly  be  added  that  if  God 


54  Postulates  of  Immortality 

is  the  Father  of  men,  endless  life  must  fol- 
low. If  there  is  a  real  relation  between 
the  Divine  conscience  and  heart  and  the 
conscience  and  heart  of  man,  it  must  be  a 
permanent  relation.  God  cannot  be  con- 
ceived as  wise  and  good  at  the  same  time 
that  he  is  believed  to  extinguish  human  life 
at  death.  Both  beliefs  cannot  be  enter- 
tained ;  one  or  the  other  must  prevail.  If 
death  is  the  end,  God  cannot  be  thought  of 
as  good  ;  if  God  is  thought  of  as  infinitely 
good,  death  cannot  be  the  end. 

The  second  position  from  which  faith  in 
the  endless  life  strengthens  itself  is  the 
reasonableness  of  the  universe.  One  great 
note  of  the  order  amid  which  men  live  is 
that  it  is  an  order.  It  is  the  expression  of 
intelligence.  The  universe  invites  to  study, 
reveals  its  secret  to  the  devoted  mind,  wins 
the  intellect  by  the  highest  of  promises, 
the  possession  of  the  truth,  into  the  open 
vision  of  at  least  part  of  its  ways.  The 
order  under  which  he  lives  inspires  the  rea- 
son of  man,  incites  to  philosophic  reflec- 


Postulates  of  Immortality  55 

tion,  fills  the  spirit  with  the  passion  for 
unity,  elicits  in  the  intelligence  the  ideal 
of  an  intelligible  world.  And  this  ideal  of 
the  universe  as  intelligible  is  the  most  fun- 
damental and  the  most  practical  of  all  our 
purely  intellectual  conceptions.  The  arm 
of  science  would  be  paralyzed  at  once  if 
the  idea  should  come  to  abide  that  the 
outward  world  is  a  hopeless  chaos.  Astron- 
omy, geology,  biology,  physiology,  psy- 
chology, ethics,  political  economy,  history, 
and  all  science  whatever  would  die  equally 
with  philosophy  if  the  reasonableness  of 
the  universe  should  be  denied  or  seriously 
doubted.  One  can  imagine  a  race  of  crea- 
tures enacting  an  immense  drama,  immense 
for  them,  on  the  exterior  of  a  soap  bubble. 
One  can  picture  their  works  of  science 
and  art  and  philosophy ;  their  sense  of 
the  bubble's  physical  properties  and  rela- 
tions, their  expression  of  its  resplendent 
beauty  as  it  floats  in  the  sunlight,  their 
comprehension  of  its  bearing  toward  the 
ultimate  reality.  And  one  can  see  that  if 


$6  Postulates  of  Immortality 

these  infinitesimal  creatures  should  come 
to  the  conclusion  that  their  abode  was  a 
mere  bubble  and  nothing  more,  some- 
thing isolated  from  all  being,  and  leading 
through  the  comprehension  of  it  to  no 
universe  beyond,  it  would  be  impossible 
for  the  scientific,  artistic,  and  philosophic 
impulses  in  them  to  remain  living  and 
fruitful.  This  must  be  one  of  the  many 
meanings  of  that  profound  remark  of 
Goethe,  that  only  the  believing  ages  are 
the  fruitful  ages.  That  the  universe  is 
throughout  intelligible,  that  it  may  be  un- 
derstood, one  part  by  another,  and  progress 
made  through  the  part  upon  the  whole,  and 
that  when  understood  it  will  be  found  ra- 
tionally satisfactory,  is  the  fundamental  as- 
sumption of  the  intellectual  exertion  of  the 
world.  And  if  it  is  plain  that  God  cannot 
be  regarded  as  infinitely  good,  if  he  denies 
to  virtue  the  "  glory  of  going  on  and  still 
to  be,"  it  is  equally  obvious  that  if  death 
be  the  end  of  man  the  ideal  of  the  universe 
as  throughout  reasonable  is  vain.  The 


Postulates  of  Immortality  57 

hopes  of  knowledge  and  of  goodness,  the 
sense  of  a  prophetic  human  fellowship,  and 
the  expectation  of  a  life  concordant  with 
the  life  of  the  universe  are  contradicted  ; 
and  the  movement  that  began  and  that  re- 
ceived fresh  momentum  from  day  to  day, 
from  faith  in  the  world  as  reasonable,  is 
turned  back  upon  itself,  and  all  things  are 
rolled  in  everlasting  confusion.  The  be- 
liever in  the  reasonableness  of  the  order 
under  which  he  lives  must  not  be  put  to 
shame ;  otherwise  the  belief  will  be  surren- 
dered. Death  as  a  finality  is  the  demon- 
stration of  the  delusion  of  belief  in  the 
universe  as  intelligible.  For  it  is  man's 
universe  that  in  the  first  place  is  supposed 
to  be  intelligible ;  not  the  absolute  uni- 
verse, whatever  that  may  mean.  And  a 
universe  that  defeats  his  best  life,  that 
contradicts  his  deepest  thought,  cannot  be 
considered,  by  man  at  least,  as  the  expres- 
sion of  Supreme  Reason. 

The  worth  of  human  life  to  the  Creator 
depends,   of   course,   upon  his   character. 


58  Postulates  of  Immortality 

If  one  is  permitted  to  construe  the  uni- 
verse through  human  personality,  and  un- 
less one  shall  take  his  stand  in  blank  ag- 
nosticism one  can  do  no  other,  the  best 
thing  to  be  done  is  to  continue  the  pro- 
cess and  interpret  the  Ultimate  Character 
through  its  highest  historic  expression. 
Humanity  has  a  better  right,  surely,  to 
claim  to  be  the  regulative  revelation  of  the 
character  of  the  Infinite  than  the  orders 
beneath  it  can  possibly  have.  And  it  is 
humanity  at  its  best  that  says,  "  He  that 
hath  seen  me  hath  seen  the  Father." 1 
The  worth  of  human  life  to  such  a  God  is 
beyond  dispute.  It  must  be  of  permanent 
value,  not  only  in  those  solitary  instances 
where  it  becomes  the  flowering  of  moral 
beauty  and  disinterested  service,  but  also 
in  our  total  humanity  so  long  as  the  bare 
possibility  of  noble  character  continues. 
If  the  Supreme  Being  loves  goodness,  the 
naked  capacity  for  it  must  lay  hold  of  his 
conserving  power.  And  therefore  one  is 

1  John  xiv.  9. 


Postulates  of  Immortality  59 

ready  for  an  expression  of  God's  moral  in- 
terest in  mankind  infinitely  wider  than 
that  to  which  one  has  been  accustomed. 
For  the  difficulty  once  surmounted  of  the 
relation  of  the  soul  to  the  body,  the  great 
obstacle  to  faith  in  the  permanence  of 
the  human  spirit  is  the  extremely  limited 
expression  that  has  been  allowed  to  the 
moral  interest  of  God  in  the  race.  It 
must  be  clear  that  if  one  is  thrown  back 
for  the  ground  of  a  given  belief  upon  the 
character  of  the  Creator,  then  only  upon 
the  widest  possible  disclosure  of  that  char- 
acter, and  the  largest  and  most  consistent 
thought  concerning  it,  can  one  find  the 
most  assured  basis  for  faith.  The  appeal 
in  behalf  of  the  permanence  of  man  is  ulti- 
mately away  from  all  matters  of  physical 
organization,  to  the  heart  of  the  universe, 
to  the  Absolute  conscience  and  pity  that 
are  believed  to  have  dominion  over  all 
things.  The  freshest  discussion  of  the 
immortality  of  man,  therefore,  must  con- 
sider it  with  reference  to  what  may  be 


60  Postulates  of  Immortality 

termed  the  new  theodicy ;  that  is,  upon 
the  faith  that  God  exists  a  morally  per- 
fect being,  what  is  the  full  logic  of  this 
position  in  a  consideration  of  the  probable 
destiny  of  man  ?  If  that  faith  is  to  con- 
tinue in  the  earth,  it  must  provide  a  field 
for  the  expression  of  God's  moral  interest 
in  the  race  commensurate  with  his  char- 
acter. There  is  no  other  way  open  for  the 
reconciliation  of  the  actual  and  the  ideal. 
The  sincerity  of  the  Divine  intention  in 
seeking  this  reconciliation,  his  unrestricted 
opportunity,  and  the  infinity  of  his  re- 
sources, must  be  put  beyond  the  possibility 
of  doubt.  So  much,  at  least,  the -faith  in 
his  absolute  goodness  necessitates.  It  is 
true  that  many  profound  and  believing 
men  to-day  abhor  all  theodicies.  The 
sense  of  the  mystery  of  human  existence 
is  so  deep  that  all  attempts  to  carry  even  a 
single  line  of  light  to  its  heart  seem  fore- 
ordained to  failure.  The  unfathomable 
depths  of  human  suffering  appear  to  be 
forever  beyond  the  plummet  of  the  explor- 


Postulates  of  Immortality  61 

ing  reason,  and  the  shadow  that  lies  upon 
the  universe  is  too  heavy  to  be  mitigated 
by  man's  thought,  however  luminous. 
Men  of  this  type  prefer  silence  upon  the 
ultimate  problems.  Still  they  live  in  the 
aboriginal  moral  sentiments  of  their  kind, 
and  their  scorn  for  theodicies  is  the  scorn 
of  those  who  through  feeling  have  tran- 
scended their  difficulty.  "  Shall  not  the 
judge  of  all  the  earth  do  right  ?  "  That  is 
the  bold  challenge  of  those  to  whom  refer- 
ence is  here  made.  The  problem  which 
human  history  raises  when  placed  in  the 
presence  of  God  is  shattered  by  the  explo- 
sion of  a  tremendous  moral  instinct.  The 
instinct  is  precious,  and  its  power  is  great. 
Let  it  continue  to  clothe  itself  in  the 
noble  words  attributed  to  the  first  Hebrew 
face  to  face  with  Sodom  and  the  Infinite, 
"Shall  not  the  judge  of  all  the  earth  do 
right?"  But  this  belief  formed  by  the 
interior  play  of  moral  feeling  becomes  a 
vast  premise  for  rational  insight.  The 
question  is  not  between  a  theodicy  and  no 


62  Postulates  of  Immortality 

theodicy,  but  between  a  theodicy  implicit 
and  a  theodicy  explicit.  Moral  feeling 
holds  in  solution  the  sublimest  vindication 
of  the  ways  of  God  to  man,  and  for  those 
who  long  to  add  vision  to  passion  it  can- 
not be  other  than  a  service  to  life  to  seek 
for  the  intellectual  content  of  the  highest 
ethical  sentiments.  If  any  one  desires  to 
renew  his  confidence  in  the  greatness  pos- 
sible to  a  theodicy,  let  him  turn  again  to 
the  second  book  of  Plato's  Republic.  He 
will  there  find  a  theodicy  in  behalf  of 
righteousness  without  which  it  is  impossi- 
ble to  be  an  honorable  man.  And  until 
the  fundamental  belief  in  the  absolute 
goodness  of  God  is  pressed  to  the  conclu- 
sions to  which  it  inevitably  leads,  the 
weight  upon  those  who  are  bearing  the 
heat  and  burden  of  the  day  must  remain 
too  heavy  to  be  borne. 


VII 

Illogical  Limitations 

INCE  absolute  moralism  or  a  uni- 
verse supremely  and  everlast- 
ingly devoted  to  moral  ends  is 
the  grand  basis  of  belief  in  a  future  life  for 
man,  it  is  necessary  to  consider  briefly  the 
various  ideas  of  limitation  that  have  been 
held  concerning  God's  interest  in  mankind. 
These  ideas,  properly  understood,  mean  a 
restriction  upon  the  moral  purpose  of  God 
and  the  moral  character  of  his  universe. 
.The  more  widely  they  prevail,  the  more 
difficult  do  they  make  belief  in  a  hereafter 
for  the  human  soul.  For  whenever  the 
ultimate  appeal  as  to  what  is  or  as  to  what 
will  be  is  taken  to  the  supreme  moral  con- 
ception, it  follows  that  only  the  noblest 
views,  only  the  judgments  that  are  in  pro- 
foundest  accord  with  their  standard,  can 


64  Illogical  Limitations 

be  true.  If  the  origin,  career,  and  destiny 
of  mankind  are  to  be  interpreted  in  accord- 
ance with  the  sublime  assumption  of  the 
moral  perfection  of  God,  only  those  ideas 
can  be  valid  which  are  consistent  with 
that  assumption.  In  a  profound  sense  in 
this  sphere,  morality  creates  and  immo- 
rality destroys  its  object.  The  supreme 
moral  conception  tells  us  what  God  must 
be  if  he  is  to  be  at  all ;  and  it  denies  the 
rights  of  God  to  any  being  whose  purpose 
and  government  fall  below  its  own  stand- 
ard. Sheer,  bare  almightiness  cannot  con- 
stitute its  possessor  the  object  of  human 
accountability  and  veneration.  Nor  can 
omniscience  raise  a  being  to  that  sovereign 
elevation.  The  absolute  character  alone 
justifies  absolute  authority  ;  the  ultimate 
source  of  all  power  and  all  obligation  is  the 
supreme  love.  The  battle  of  belief  and 
unbelief  must  finally  be  settled  upon  this 
field.  The  believer  must  purge  his  faith 
as  Gideon  did  his  army ;  he  must  exalt  the 
whole  series  of  conceptions  that  go  to  form 


Illogical  Limitations  65 

it ;  he  must  work  it  over  into  a  pure  and 
consistent  moralism,  into  a  scheme  that 
begins  and  ends  in  the  perfect  love  of 
God.  Anything  less  than  this  outside  the 
sheltered  fold  of  traditional  orthodoxy  has 
already  become  incredible.  Anything  less 
than  philosophical  loyalty  to  the  absolute 
moralism  of  Jesus  Christ  handicaps  faith 
hopelessly,  gives  skeptical  thought  an  im- 
mense advantage,  manufactures  obstacles 
against  its  own  success,  and  indeed  creates 
the  forces  that  ultimately  make  its  pro- 
gress impossible.  As  unbelief  must  be 
pushed  into  full  consistency,  as  it  must 
be  stripped  of  the  alleviations  that  come 
from  poor  logic  and  from  the  associations 
of  faith  that  have  gone  to  form  the  bet- 
ter spirit  of  the  unbeliever,  as  negative 
thought  must  be  shown  as  at  last  atheis- 
tic thought,  and  this  type  of  thinker  must 
be  compelled  to  do  battle  for  his  convic- 
tions from  the  position  of  absolute  pes- 
simism, so  the  antagonistic  view  of  the 
world,  the  vision  of  belief,  must  be  lifted 


66  Illogical  Limitations 

into  the  completes!  attainable  correspond- 
ence with  the  supreme  historic  mind,  the 
mind  of  Christ.  Only  thus  can  men  see 
where  they  are  and  what  they  are  facing  ; 
only  thus  can  the  true  nature  of  the  con- 
test be  determined,  and  the  issues  on  the 
one  side  and  on  the  other  be  decisively 
discerned. 

It  is  usual  to  discredit  the  view  that  holds 
to  the  unlimited  moral  interest  of  God  in 
mankind  by  applying  to  it  the  evil  epithet 
of  universalism.  But  universalism  is  not 
raised  as  a  question  of  fact  by  the  position 
above  taken,  but  only,  if  at  all,  as  matter  of 
inference,  and  that,  too,  in  a  region  where 
inferences  can  never  become  more  than 
hopes.  In  a  root  and  branch  discussion 
the  philosophical  and  the  homiletical  inter- 
ests must  not  be  confounded.  If  all  men 
were  philosophers,  the  two  interests  would 
be  seen  to  be  identical,  but  all  men  are  not 
philosophers.  Still  the  fundamental  prob- 
lem of  speculative  theology  and  preach- 
ing is  the  same.  It  concerns  the  charac- 


Illogical  Limitations  67 

ter  of  God  ;  and  nothing,  in  the  long  run, 
can  strengthen  the  arm  of  moral  appeal 
that  is  not  warranted  by  the  highest  con- 
ception of  the  Divine  character.  It  is  this 
conception  that  is  now  under  discussion, 
and  the  full  logic  of  which  it  is  deemed 
desirable  to  employ  in  vindication  of  belief 
in  the  immortality  of  man.  To  try  to  dis- 
credit it  by  the  cry  of  universalism  is  to 
mistake  the  issue.  Universalism  is  a  doc- 
trine that  has  to  do  with  matters  of  fact, 
that  contends  that,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  all 
men  will  finally  be  saved.  The  position 
above  taken  concerns  God's  relation  to 
mankind,  inquires  after  his  disposition  to- 
ward the  human  race,  and  from  the  as- 
sumption that  he  is  a  Being  absolutely 
good  concludes  as  to  what  must  be  the 
scope  of  his  moral  purpose. 

The  only  alternative  to  this  final  ap- 
peal to  the  moral  reason  of  man,  qualified 
for  its  task  of  judgment  by  long  discipline 
in  the  school  of  Christ,  the  sovereign 
moral  teacher,  is  the  complete  abdication 


68  Illogical  Limitations 

of  thought.  As  the  uneducated  mind  be- 
lieves that  the  outward  world  is  what  it 
appears  to  be,  colored,  sounding,  fragrant, 
and  solid,  as  it  believes  that  grass  is  green, 
the  sky  blue,  the  flower  beautiful,  the 
mountain  a  mass  of  rock,  independent  of 
the  mind  that  considers,  so  there  are  those 
who  find  the  standard  of  religious  belief 
in  the  accepted  traditions  of  the  world. 
Whatever  their  name  or  denomination, 
wherever  they  sojourn,  their  true  home  is 
in  the  Roman  church.  The  realm  of  no- 
reason  is  their  dwelling-place,  and  the 
church  of  mere  will-worship  must  continue 
to  be  their  sanctuary.  That  agnostics 
should  become  Romanists  seems  to  certain 
writers  strange ;  the  truth  is  that  when 
religious  feeling  takes  possession  of  these 
men  they  can  logically  become  nothing 
else.  Their  moral  reason  still  remains  in- 
competent to  discover  or  to  justify  the 
supreme  object  of  religious  feeling,  or  the 
manner  in  which  that  object  should  be  wor- 
shiped. Nothing  remains  for  the  poor 


Illogical  Limitations  69 

agnostic  who  has  had  the  misfortune  to 
become  devout  but  to  fall  back  upon  tradi- 
tion and  accept  the  contents  of  faith  on 
authority.  It  is  devout  agnosticism  that 
to-day  is  becoming  the  mother  of  a  mena- 
cing institutionalism  that  is  exerting  itself 
to  install  over  the  religious  mind  extreme 
high  churchism.  Let  it  be  understood  that 
the  movement  originates  and  derives  all 
its  vigor  from  the  acknowledged  incompe- 
tence of  the  moral  reason  of  man  to  fix 
the  object  of  his  worship,  and  Protestants 
will  see  the  alternative  that  divides  the 
field  against  them  with  atheism. 

The  first  grand  form  of  limitation  upon 
the  moral  interest  of  God  in  mankind  is 
presented  in  the  Hebrew  idea  of  the  rem- 
nant. No  blame,  intellectual  or  moral, 
attaches  to  Isaiah  in  consequence  of  this 
idea.  It  was  the  best  that  he  could  do, 
even  under  special  inspiration,  amio!  the 
mad  condition  of  the  times  in  which  he 
lived.  He  held  in  his  heart  of  hearts  the 
faith  in  the  victorious  future  of  Israel 


jro  Illogical  Limitations 

upon  this  earth,  and  at  the  same  time  he 
saw  her  utterly  unworthy  of  her  high  call- 
ing and  completely  incapable  of  advancing 
upon  it.  What  remained  was  simply  to 
look  upon  history  as  the  operation  of  the 
moral  judgment  of  God,  destroying  unwor- 
thy Israel,  like  a  doomed  tree,  and  when 
the  evil  growths  were  cut  down  and  burned, 
feeding  the  hopes  of  the  future  upon  the 
fresh  sprouts  sent  up  from  the  living  roots. 
This  was  the  way  in  which  the  greatest  of 
the  Hebrew  prophets  met  the  problem 
springing  from  the  sublime  faith  and  the 
terrible  history  of  his  nation.  He  could 
not  surrender  the  faith,  and  he  could  not 
recognize  in  the  actual  nation  the  true 
nation.  There  was  for  Isaiah  but  one 
way  out  of  the  difficulty.  The  unworthy 
nation  shall  be  destroyed ;  the  worthy 
remnant  shall  abide,  and  from  this  a  new, 
holy,  and  victorious  people  shall  come,  in 
whom  the  original  purpose  of  God  will  be 
realized. 

This  is  a  theodicy  independent  of  a  fu- 


Illogical  Limitations  ji 

ture  world.  It  is  a  theodicy  exclusively  for 
Israel.  It  is  a  theodicy  according  to  which 
the  nation  as  a  whole  perishes,  and  only 
the  remnant  survives.  It  is  a  justification 
of  the  ways  of  God  with  Israel  which  in- 
volves a  tremendous  miscarriage  of  the 
Divine  purpose.  It  was  the  best  that  even 
transcendent  spiritual  genius  could  at  that 
time  achieve,  but  as  applied  to  Israel  it  is 
utterly  incredible  as  a  statement  of  the 
whole  truth ;  and  when  applied  to  the  na- 
tions of  the  earth  contemporary  with  Israel, 
and  to  the  teeming  millions  of  the  entire 
historic  and  prehistoric  periods  of  human 
life,  it  becomes  monstrous.  If  it  is  a  true 
description  of  the  Divine  method  with 
humanity,  it  must  break  down  all  confi- 
dence in  the  power  and  goodness  of  God. 
If  it  is  anything  more  than  a  half  truth,  a 
merely  introductory  statement  preparing 
the  way  for  the  larger  truth,  it  excludes  all 
idea  of  a  future  life  for  man,  and  it  makes 
intelligent  trust  in  the  Creator  impossible. 
One  cannot  avoid  the  feeling  that  a  cer- 


72  Illogical  Limitations 

tain  injustice  is  done  a  great  spiritual 
leader  by  isolating  one  of  his  ideas  from 
its  context,  and  by  giving  it  an  application 
which  perhaps  he  never  meant  to  give  to 
it.  It  may  be  that  as  a  doctrine  for  this 
world  it  was  subordinate  in  his  thought 
to  some  larger  conception  for  whose  utter- 
ance he  might  have  felt  that  the  times 
were  not  ripe.  Still  the  idea  of  the  salva- 
tion of  the  remnant  accords  so  well  with  the 
doctrine  of  the  survival  of  the  fittest,  and 
with  other  theories  of  limitation  about  to  be 
mentioned,  that,  even  at  the  risk  of  seem- 
ing to  do  dishonor  to  a  permanent  inspirer 
of  men,  it  is  necessary  to  show  the  total 
inconsistency  of  one  of  his  conceptions, 
when  converted  into  a  finished  philosophy 
of  history,  and  made  to  cover  the  entire 
career  of  man  with  the  belief  in  the  moral 
perfection  of  God.  No  believer  in  the 
salvation  of  a  remnant  only  can  show  the 
slightest  ground  in  moral  reason  for  belief 
in  anything  that  is  worth  believing. 

This  leads  to  the  church  doctrine  of  elec- 


Illogical  Limitations  75 

tion  which  still  stands  in  many  of  the  pop- 
ular creeds,  and  which  is  taught  in  nearly 
all  the  theological  systems  from  Augustine 
to  Shedd.  Again,  it  must  be  said  that 
with  the  conditions  which  these  thinkers 
imposed  upon  themselves  it  was  impos- 
sible to  do  other  than  they  did.  To  those 
who  believed  that  one  text  of  Scripture 
carried  as  much  authority  as  another,  a 
restricted  theory  of  salvation  was  a  neces- 
sity. Where  criticism  of  the  contents  of 
the  Bible  was  forbidden,  where  the  deter- 
mination of  all  Biblical  truth  by  the  abso- 
lute moralism  of  Christ  was  not  insisted 
upon,  where  it  was  incumbent  upon  the 
believer  to  construct  his  creed  from  the 
whole  body  of  the  Scriptures,  any  other 
conclusion  than  that  at  which  he  arrived 
was  out  of  the  question.  The  patristic 
Augustine,  the  reformer  Calvin,  and  the 
puritan  Edwards  were  each  like  a  Sam- 
son shorn  of  his  strength  trying  to  defy 
the  Philistines.  The  conditions  made  suc- 
cessful resistance  hopeless  from  the  start. 


J4  Illogical  Limitations 

And  there  are  few  sadder  or  more  tragic 
scenes  in  the  history  of  the  higher  thought 
of  the  world  than  the  spectacle  of  these 
mighty  thinkers,  sightless  in  the  presence 
of  the  most  fundamental  of  all  the  moral 
problems  of  man,  grinding  in  the  prison 
of  the  great  adversaries  of  faith,  and  thus 
contributing  to  the  support  of  the  unbelief 
against  which  they  had  contended  all  their 
lives.  The  memory  of  the  heroic  charac- 
ter, by  which  it  will  be  found  at  last  that 
they  slew  more  than  by  all  their  deftly 
constructed  orthodoxies,  does  indeed  soften 
regret  for  their  errors,  and  confers  upon 
them  a  clear  title  to  grateful  and  everlast- 
ing remembrance.  They  are  here  referred 
to  as  the  great  advocates  of  the  theological 
doctrine  of  election,  a  doctrine  which 
destroys  the  grand  premise  for  belief  in 
the  immortality  of  man,  because  it  makes 
the  conception  of  the  moral  perfection  of 
God  empty  and  incredible.  The  sorest  in- 
justice to  the  thinkers  named  above  is 
done,  not  by  those  who  practice  upon  them 


Illogical  Limitations  75 

a  wise  selection  and  a  reasonable  rejection, 
but  by  those  who  perpetuate  their  errors  ; 
errors  for  which  it  is  easy  to  find  palliating 
circumstances  in  the  case  of  the  masters, 
but  for  which,  in  the  conditions  of  their 
disciples  of  to-day,  there  can  be  no  valid 
excuse.  Election  as  it  has  prevailed,  and 
as  it  is  to  be  feared  it  still  prevails  in  many 
places,  —  election  and  faith  in  a  moral 
Deity  are  conceptions  mutually  and  eter- 
nally exclusive. 

The  form  which  the  ancient  idea  of  the 
limitation  upon  God's  interest  in  man  most 
frequently  bears  in  our  time  is  that  of 
opportunity  of  salvation  for  this  life  only. 
Character  for  eternity  is  fixed  in  time.  In 
this  way  it  is  thought  a  grander  earnest- 
ness will  attach  itself  to  human  endeavor, 
a  more  solemn  and  tremendous  importance 
to  the  present  opportunity.  The  motives 
which  have  led  to  the  restriction  of  the 
moral  opportunity  for  man  to  this  world 
have  been,  in  many  cases  at  least,  of  the 
noblest  character.  They  have  been,  in 


yd  Illogical  Limitations 

the  first  instance,  motives  of  fidelity  to  the 
Bible  and  its  teachings  ;  and  in  the  second, 
they  have  risen  out  of  the  passionate  desire 
to  guard  the  interests  of  righteousness. 
The  mistake  of  the  position  was  twofold. 
The  Bible  was  made  for  man,  not  man  for 
the  Bible ;  and  the  book  must  be  made 
subservient  to  the  Christian  interests  of 
life.  The  other  mistake  was  in  supposing 
that  the  strenuousness  of  existence  which 
the  view  in  question  sought  to  guard,  and 
the  idea  of  righteousness  which  it  justly 
held  to  be  supreme,  were  in  mortal  peril 
under  the  protection  of  any  other  view. 
Those  who  refuse  to  limit  the  grace  of 
God  to  this  world  believe  that  righteous- 
ness is  its  own  safeguard,  and  that  in  con- 
sequence human  life  retains  its  strenuous- 
ness,  made  all  the  more  impressive  because 
fired  by  a  new  confidence  in  God  and  a 
larger  hope  for  mankind. 

It  must  now  be  said  that  a  doctrine  that 
confines  the  moral  opportunity  of  man  to 
this  life  undermines  faith  in  the  moral 


Illogical  Limitations  77 

character  of  God.  To  say  that  the  Creator 
has  a  supreme  moral  interest  in  human 
beings,  that  he  is  full  of  compassion  for 
them,  and  offers  to  help  them  into  the  way 
of  righteousness  during  the  brief  and  un- 
certain period  of  their  existence  upon  this 
earth,  but  that  after  death  his  mood  is  one 
of  unalterable  mercilessness  toward  all  the 
failures  in  time,  and  that  the  environment 
of  the  future  is  so  constructed  as  to  make 
the  desire  for  ethical  improvement  —  sup- 
posing it  to  exist,  which  is  not  at  all  un- 
likely —  eternally  ineffectual,  is  to  destroy 
forever  the  moral  idea  of  God.  Nor  are 
alleviations  of  this  dismal  hypothesis  at  all 
sufficient ;  such  as  the  provision  of  a  future 
chance  for  those  who  have  had  no  Chris- 
tian opportunity  upon  earth.  That  makes 
a  bad  conception  a  trifle  less  incredible, 
but  no  more.  It  does  not  meet  the  ques- 
tion, What  does  the  perfect  and  immutable 
character  of  God,  as  the  Creator  and  Fa- 
ther of  men,  necessitate  in  his  relation  to 
the  race  ?  The  question  is  not  what  men 


j8  Illogical  Limitations 

deserve,  but  what  God's  honor  demands. 
The  old  theology,  which  is  always  to  be 
distinguished  from  the  old  religion  and  em- 
phatically from  the  Christian  religion,  was 
full  of  shuffle  and  sophism  here.  It  con- 
tended for  the  eternal  willingness  of  God 
to  save ;  threw  the  blame  upon  the  lost ; 
and  all  the  while  it  knew  perfectly  well 
that  the  willingness  of  man  to  accept  salva- 
tion is  the  final  outcome  of  the  willingness 
of  God  to  bestow  it.  The  theory  in  ques- 
tion draws  a  circle,  larger  or  smaller  as  the 
case  may  be,  within  which,  at  most,  is  gath- 
ered an  insignificant  minority  of  the  human 
beings  who  have  lived  upon  the  earth,  over 
which  the  saving  purpose  of  God  extends, 
but  beyond  which  to  the  countless  millions 
who  exist  there  he  is  compassionless  and 
implacable.  Now  this  is  the  same  thing 
logically  as  to  say  that  one  can  cut  out  a 
circle  in  space,  within  which  the  law  of 
gravitation  operates,  and  where  the  order 
and  beauty  that  always  follow  may  be  be- 
held ;  but  beyond  which  there  is  no  grav- 


Illogical  Limitations  79 

itation,  no  law  of  space,  and  where  nothing 
exists  except  chaos  and  utter  contradiction. 
The  answer  to  such  a  wild  fancy  would  be 
that  space  is  forever  the  same,  that  grav- 
itation can  be  nowhere  unless  it  is  every- 
where. And  similarly  the  sufficient  ex- 
posure of  the  illogical  theory  in  question 
is  contained  in  the  bare  statement  that 
God  is  the  Father  of  lights,  from  whom 
cometh  down  every  good  and  perfect  gift, 
who  is  without  variableness  or  the  shadow 
that  is  cast  by  turning.  In  all  worlds  God 
is  the  same,  and  his  moral  interest  in  men 
and  his  endeavor  for  them  must  be  equal 
to  the  duration  of  their  existence. 

The  unrelenting  assertion  of  the  theory 
of  a  probation  for  men  for  this  life  only, 
coupled  with  the  declaration  that  without 
the  knowledge  of  Jesus  Christ  salvation  is 
impossible,  has  told  tremendously  upon  the 
sublime  inclination  of  human  beings  to 
trust  their  Maker.  This  sort  of  thinking 
and  preaching  has  made  men  suspicious  of 
the  Supreme  Being,  has  broken  down  the 


8o  Illogical  Limitations 

great  expectation  which  all  souls  naturally 
have  from  God,  and  has  left  them  without 
the  premise  that  is  indispensable  for  faith 
in  the  future  life  —  confidence  in  the  char- 
acter of  the  Eternal.  The  old  theodicies, 
whether  of  the  remnant,  or  election,  or  the 
restriction  of  moral  opportunity  to  this  life, 
rend  asunder  the  ethical  idea  of  God. 
They  are  like  old  forts,  to  be  praised  for 
the  service  they  rendered  in  straitened 
days,  and  at  the  same  time  to  be  univer- 
sally abandoned,  as  no  longer  of  any  use, 
except  to  the  enemies  of  faith.  Robert  G. 
Ingersoll  and  others  like  him  depend  for 
their  supplies  upon  a  theory  of  the  Bible 
which  every  enlightened  believer  has  left 
behind  him,  and  upon  a  philosophy  of  the 
Christian  religion  utterly  discredited  by 
the  moral  reason  of  man,  and  above  all  by 
the  Christian  religion  itself. 


VIII 

The  New  Humanity 

HE  advent  of  the  doctrine  of  evo- 
lution has  done  much  to  discredit 
old  notions  of  the  relation  of  God 
to  mankind.  The  vista  of  humanity  which 
it  has  opened  to  the  mind  of  our  time  is  so 
vast  and  bewildering  that  religious  think- 
ers everywhere  have  felt  compelled,  as  in 
the  light  of  a  further  revelation  of  God,  to 
reinterpret  old  beliefs.  With  the  entire 
field  of  humanity  fairly  within  sight,  with 
even  but  an  imperfect  sense  of  the  reach 
and  fullness  of  the  spaces  that  beings  like 
ourselves  have  peopled,  standing  only  in 
the  early  dawn  of  this  wide  and  wondrous 
day,  it  has  been  found  impossible  to  work 
the  old  ideas  of  limitation,  whether  rem- 
nant, election,  or  probation  restricted  to 
this  life.  For  such  minds  the  work  of  ref- 


82  The  New  Humanity 

utation  is  already  accomplished  ;  the  new 
wine  has  burst  the  old  wine-skins.  No 
intelligent  person  who  for  an  hour  takes 
in  the  new  situation,  and  allows  it  its  legiti- 
mate influence  upon  the  mind,  can  ever 
again  support  the  traditional  idea  which 
limits  God's  saving  interest  in  the  race  to 
this  earth.  A  new  humanity  has  arisen,  in 
number  exceeding  the  stars.  It  is  too  vast 
and  noble  to  be  consigned  to  perdition, 
unless  all  men  are  so  consigned ;  and  it  is 
too  crude  for  any  sphere  except  one  full  of 
incentives  to  progress.  It  is  this  new  hu- 
manity that  the  religious  thinker  of  to-day 
must  reckon  with,  whose  semi-brutal  char- 
acter and  amazing  capacities  for  ethical 
improvement  he  must  equally  acknowledge, 
and  whom  he  must  cover  with  the  everlast- 
ing mercy  of  God. 

It  must  further  be  observed  that  the 
goal  of  evolution  has  given  new  strength 
to  hope.  The  cosmic  process  aims  at  the 
improvement  of  life,  and  when  it  fails  here, 
as  it  has  hitherto  failed  in  the  decided 


The  New  Humanity  83 

ethical  improvement  of  mankind  in  general, 
it  need  not  be  held  that  the  failure  is  final. 
The  purpose  to  lift  life  to  its  highest  pos- 
sible level,  which  is  what  the  doctrine  of 
natural  selection  means,  need  not  be  more, 
in  the  case  of  man,  than  a  purpose  tempo- 
rarily defeated.  There  is  nothing  to  forbid 
the  supposition  that  the  cosmic  or  Divine 
endeavor  will  be  renewed  upon  another 
and  happier  field.  The  idea  of  an  end 
toward  which  everything  moves  according 
to  its  kind  is  one  full  of  the  richest  prom- 
ise. Anything  more  than  temporary  de- 
feat is  too  tremendous  an  accusation  to 
bring  against  the  universe,  especially  in 
the  sphere  of  its  highest  endeavor,  and  in 
the  case  of  its  final  product  in  time.  The 
doctrine  of  final  causes,  the  idea  of  ends, 
and  the  responsibility  of  the  universe  for 
their  fulfillment,  has  gained  new  strength 
and  impressiveness  from  evolution. 

What  may  be  termed  the  reversal  of 
the  method  of  animal  evolution,  when  the 
process  arrives  at  the  character  of  human 


84  The  New  Humanity 

beings,  and  which  Dr.  John  Fiske  has  pre- 
sented so  strikingly  in  his  "  Destiny  of 
Man,"  is  another  freshly  open  fountain  of 
moral  hope.  The  love  of  life,  and  the  vic- 
torious struggle  for  it  against  countless 
enemies,  which  has  been  perhaps  the  main, 
although  by  no  means  the  unmodified  or 
only  method  of  advance  in  the  animal 
world,  undergoes  revision  and  even  rever- 
sal, when  evolution  reaches  the  higher 
possibilities  of  the  human  race.  The  sense 
of  justice  upon  which  civilization  depends, 
the  sentiment  of  pity  without  which  man 
cannot  be  man,  the  passion  of  love  the  sov- 
ereignty of  which  would  mean  the  perfec- 
tion of  human  character,  call  for  the  pre- 
dominance of  purposes  that  are  other  than 
self-regarding.  If  self-regarding  purposes 
are  still  retained,  as  they  ever  must  be, 
they  are  nevertheless  transformed,  and  the 
self  is  no  longer  the  isolated  and  Ishmael- 
itish  self  whose  hand  is  against  every  other 
hand,  but  the  self  that  is  in  accord  with 
the  Universal  Self,  and  whose  perpetual 


The  New  Humanity  85 

prayer   is    "  Not   my  will,   but   thine,   be 
done." 

This  new  epoch,  opened  up  by  the  be- 
ginning of  the  serious  and  more  constant 
development  of  the  moral  life  of  the  race, 
projects  upon  the  horizon  of  the  future  the 
fairest  hopes.  The  transfer  is  from  a  realm 
ethical  only  by  anticipation,  moral  only  by 
tendency  and  aspiration,  to  one  where  mo- 
rality is  the  sovereign  consideration.  We 
are  no  longer  in  the  flesh  but  in  the  spirit. 
Henceforth,  having  been  lifted  into  the 
sphere  of  the  spirit,  into  the  order  of  a 
universe  whose  law  is  love,  we  are  to  dis- 
cover, so  far  as  we  can,  its  character  and 
scope,  and  to  consider  what  pledges  it 
gives  concerning  the  destiny  of  mankind. 
And  upon  this  level  the  very  idea  of  de- 
velopment, as  setting  forth  the  universal 
method  of  the  Creator,  becomes  prophetic. 
When  man's  ethical  nature  is  reached,  and 
where  so  much  room  and  material  for  de- 
velopment exist,  it  would  seem  to  be  not  a 
violent  inference  from  evolution  to  suppose 


86  The  New  Humanity 

that  this  world  is  but  the  first  stage  in  the 
moral  discipline  of  the  race ;  that  there  are 
other  worlds  to  follow  where  the  discipline 
is  continued,  and  that  in  the  line  of  this 
consideration  the  magnificence  of  the  old 
words  appear  :  — 

"  I  have  seen  an  end  of  all  perfection, 
But  thy  commandment  is  exceeding  broad."  l 

If  evolution  is  to  be  theistically  employed, 
—  and  employed  in  no  other  way  can  it 
consistently  be,  —  the  amazing  sense  of 
humanity  which  it  inspires  must  work 
freedom  from  inadequate  notions  of  the 
relation  of  God  to  mankind,  the  goal  at 
which  it  aims  must  create  expectations  of 
a  renewed  and  successful  endeavor  for  the 
race,  the  reversal  of  its  method  must  open 
to  faith  a  Divine  universe,  where  the  pro- 
vision for  the  ascent  of  man  is  the  old 
vision  of  Origen  transfigured,  of  an  infinite 
stairway  of  worlds  reaching  to  the  throne 
of  God. 

The  main  value,  however,  in  the  present 

1  Ps.  cxix.  96. 


The  New  Humanity  87 

discussion  of  the  doctrine  of  evolution  is 
in  forcing  an  alternative.  The  mass  of 
humanity  which  it  rolls  into  the  field  of 
vision  is  so  great  that  the  moral  concep- 
tion of  the  universe  must  either  rise  to 
meet  the  new  emergency  or  perish.  If 
the  moral  view  of  man's  life  shall  insist 
upon  identifying  itself  with  theories  of  the 
remnant,  election,  or  probation  confined  to 
this  life,  it  is  simply  taking  steps  to  de- 
stroy itself.  For  no  man  in  his  senses 
can  survey  the  bewildering  total  of  human- 
ity that  evolution  puts  before  him,  and 
admit  that  the  saving  interest  of  God  in 
mankind  ceases  at  death,  and  still  believe 
that  God  is  a  moral  being.  It  is  either 
something  other  and  infinitely  better  than 
this,  or  it  is  nothing.  The  moral  view  of 
the  universe,  by  which  is  understood  the 
utter  righteousness  and  fatherly  kindness 
of  the  Supreme  Being,  must  fight  for  its 
life.  To  meet  the  necessities  of  the  case 
presented  by  the  new  humanity,  it  must 
itself  undergo  evolution.  It  is  for  this 


88  The  New  Humanity 

great  service  that  the  believer  in  God 
should  be  most  grateful  to  evolution.  It 
drives  him  back  upon  the  deepest  concep- 
tion in  his  faith,  it  compels  him  to  con- 
sider afresh  the  significance  of  the  idea 
of  righteousness,  it  forces  him  to  an  al- 
ternative. Either  this  world  is  a  moral 
world,  or  it  is  not ;  if  it  is  a  moral  world, 
the  Creator's  redeeming  interest  in  man- 
kind must  continue  forever.  If  the  limi- 
tation put  upon  the  Divine  purpose  by  the 
Latin  theology,  and  by  what  still  passes 
among  us  in  all  denominations  for  ortho- 
doxy, is  true,  every  man  who  understands, 
in  the  least  degree,  the  waste  of  life  that 
this  involves  over  the  unmeasured  ex- 
panses of  time  must  abandon  faith  in  the 
moral  perfection  of  God.  If  this  is  true, 
men  have  no  Father  in  heaven ;  if  men 
have  a  Father  in  heaven,  this  is  not  true ! 
One  must  either  surrender  as  vain  the 
moral  view  of  the  world,  or,  holding  it  as 
valid,  take  advantage  of  the  irresistible 
logic  of  it,  stake  everything  upon  the  full 


The  New  Humanity  89 

and  magnificent  idea,  and  stand  by  a  faith 
that  fills  the  universe  with  light,  the  old 
faith  that  "  God  is  light,  and  in  him  is  no 
darkness  at  all." 1 

1  I  John  i.  5. 


IX 

The   New   Theatre  for  the  Absolute  Moral 
Purpose 

E  are  thus  introduced  to  the  new 
theatre  of  the  Absolute  Moral 
Purpose.  The  entire  period  of 
humanity  upon  this  earth  is  covered  by  it ; 
the  total  drama  of  man's  existence  in  this 
world  is  the  revelation  of  the  beginning  of 
God's  endeavor  to  bring  his  sons  home  to 
glory.  The  universe  in  its  total  relation 
to  man  is  a  moral,  or,  if  the  term  be  pre- 
ferred, a  redemptive  universe.  As  man's 
highest  attainment  is  his  hunger  and  thirst 
after  righteousness,  so  the  sublimest  beati- 
tude of  God  himself  would  seem  to  be 
the  eternal  passion  to  make  righteousness 
sovereign  over  all  his  moral  creatures. 
Man's  field  of  service  for  time  is  the  world ; 
God's  for  eternity  is  the  universe  that  he 


The  Absolute  Moral  Purpose  gi 
has  made,  in  so  far  as  it  is  capable  of  shar- 
ing his  life. 

This  view  of  the  sphere  of  the  Divine 
purpose  is  held  as  the  inevitable  conclu- 
sion from  a  consistent  moral  scheme  of 
the  universe ;  above  all  it  is  held  as  the 
sole  logical  issue  of  the  absolute  moralism 
of  Jesus  Christ.  It  is  with  the  moral  char- 
acter of  God,  the  moral  order  of  the  world, 
the  moral  condition  and  hope  of  man,  the 
moral  nature  of  his  own  mission,  and  the 
transcendent  moral  effect  in  history  of 
his  own  career,  that  the  mind  of  Christ 
is  incessantly  and  absorbingly  occupied. 
Everything  is  placed  and  everything  is 
judged  according  to  a  sovereign  moral  con- 
ception, and  the  apostles  who  say  that  God 
is  love  are  but  giving  epigrammatic  ex- 
pression to  the  entire  body  of  their  Mas- 
ter's teaching.  It  is  this  conception  at 
its  best,  accepted  directly  from  Christ  the 
supreme  master  of  it,  that  believers  to-day 
are  to  handle  against  its  great  adversary, 
the  conception  of  a  universe  indifferent  to 


92         The  Absolute  Moral  Purpose 

the  fate  of  its  own  highest  achievements, 
and  regardless  of  man  in  his  origin,  career, 
and  destiny,  without  purpose  and  without 
heart,  hurrying  forward  to  the  grave  at 
express  speed  all  the  human  life  upon  this 
planet,  and  drowning  all  in  the  abysses  of 
eternal  death. 

It  is  not  forgotten,  and  to  obviate  mis- 
understanding it  is  here  and  now  recalled, 
that  fine  views  do  not  necessarily  make 
fine  men,  that  a  grand  theological  scheme 
does  not  of  itself  alone  reconstruct  bad 
character,  transform  wicked  society,  and 
institute  the  kingdom  of  God  upon  the 
earth.  It  is  distinctly  borne  in  mind  and 
solemnly  cherished,  that  the  achievement 
of  moral  character  by  men  and  families  and 
by  human  society  at  large  involves  a  pro- 
cess of  long  continuance  and  of  the  utmost 
strenuousness.  Seriousness  in  the  pres- 
ence of  the  momentous  moral  task  of  ex- 
istence is  the  only  permissible  mood.  Of 
that  which  has  been  from  the  beginning, 
both  the  shameful  creation  and  the  inex- 


The  Absolute  Moral  Purpose         93 

pressible  affliction  of  mankind,  of  human 
sin,  it  is  impossible  to  entertain  views  too 
profound,  so  long  as  we  do  not  date  it 
from  the  Eternal,  nor  make  God  responsi- 
ble for  its  permanence.  The  way  up  from 
the  animal  condition  into  that  of  the  per- 
fected son  of  God  remains  an  agony  and 
a  bloody  sweat.  Nothing  can  change  that 
pathway  of  torture  and  tears,  nothing  can 
mitigate  its  iron  and  everlasting  necessi- 
ties. At  the  same  time  the  struggling  will 
desires  to  know  whether  the  process  is  a 
reality,  whether  the  sore  travail  is  ever  to 
come  to  the  birth,  whether  the  universe 
is  for  man  or  against  him  when  he  sets  his 
heart  upon  the  moral  ideal.  A  creed  is  a 
necessity  for  human  action ;  for  it  is  sim- 
ply the  plan  of  campaign,  with  the  sum  of 
the  motives  that  flow  from  it,  which  make 
struggle  rational  and  the  hope  of  victory 
possible.  No  creed  at  all  paralyzes  the 
will  and  eliminates  it  from  the  problem  of 
living ;  a  bad  creed  distorts  the  character 
and  arrests  the  development  of  power ;  the 


94  The  Absolute  Moral  Purpose 
highest  possible  creed,  the  absolute  moral- 
ism  of  Christ,  gives  the  largest  inspiration 
and  the  profoundest  justification  to  the 
best  thoughts  and  activities  of  man.  The 
effort,  therefore,  to  reach  the  better  belief 
is  always  an  effort  in  the  interest  of  the 
better  behavior. 

It  will  also  be  found  that  the  view  here 
advanced  upon  philosophical  grounds  is 
not  without  wide  support  in  the  writings 
of  the  New  Testament  outside  of  the 
utterances  of  Christ.  Some  of  the  sub- 
limest  passages  in  the  epistles  of  Paul  are 
severely  let  alone,  as  leading  the  mind  in 
unorthodox  directions.  The  assertion  of 
the  universality  of  the  Divine  purpose  in 
the  eleventh  chapter  of  Romans  is  sel- 
dom noted  ;  nor  the  Pauline  pantheism  in 
the  fifteenth  of  the  first  letter  to  the  Cor- 
inthians ;  nor  again  the  mighty  faith  that 
of  Him,  and  through  Him,  and  unto  Him 
are  all  things.1  The  absoluteness  of  the 
moral  views,  the  sovereignty  of  the  Divine 

1  Romans  xi.  36 ;  Hebrews  ii.  10. 


The  Absolute  Moral  Purpose         95 

universe  expressed  in  these  and  similar 
passages,  will  yet  create  a  literature  more 
abundant  and  infinitely  nobler  than  that 
which  other  sentences,  isolated  from  them, 
and  thus  made  to  conflict  with  them,  have 
generated.  Students  of  the  literary  records 
of  the  teachings  of  Christ  and  his  apostles 
should  be  slow  to  admit  that  the  religion 
that  has,  as  matter  of  history,  created  the 
moral  view  of  the  universe,  can  be  right- 
fully employed  to  support  limitations  upon 
its  sovereignty  that  destroy  it  altogether. 


X 

Determinism  and  Freedom 

HE  scheme  here  outlined  may 
raise  against  itself  the  objection 
that  it  is  a  determinism  in  the 
interest  of  universal  salvation.  As  to  uni- 
versal salvation,  no  scheme  is  to  be  iden- 
tified with  that  doctrine  simply  because  it 
faces  that  way,  works  toward  it  as  an  ulti- 
mate goal,  and  even  hopes  for  such  an 
issue  from  the  moral  travail  of  Christian 
history,  unless  it  shall  go  a  step  farther 
and  dogmatically  affirm  the  restoration  of 
all.  The  dogmatic  assertion  of  the  salva- 
tion of  all  men  is  universalism,  as  com- 
monly understood,  and  nothing  else  is. 
The  interest  of  the  view  maintained  is 
concerned,  not  with  matters  of  fact,  not 
with  things  which  the  completed  history 
of  the  world  alone  can  determine,  but 


Determinism  and  Freedom          97 

with  purpose,  aim,  outlook,  tendency,  and 
legitimate  hope.  A  protest  is  hereby  en- 
tered, therefore,  against  the  identification 
of  the  scheme  here  advanced  with  the  doc- 
trine known  as  universal  salvation. 

As  to  the  charge  of  determinism,  even 
if  it  were  true,  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  it 
should  be  theologically  objectionable.  Au- 
gustinianism,  Calvinism,  and  Edwardean- 
ism  are  all  forms  of  determinism,  and  it 
is  impossible  to  name  any  really  great  sys- 
tem of  theology  that  is  not  open  to  the 
same  characterization.  The  trouble  with 
these  schemes  is  not  that  they  are  forms 
of  determinism,  but  that  their  determin- 
ism is  of  an  objectionable  kind.  Where 
the  purpose  of  God  is  held  to  control  all 
things,  as  in  these  systems,  and  where 
that  purpose  secures  eternal  life  for  some 
before  the  foundations  of  the  world,  and 
permits  eternal  death  for  others  from  a 
similar  antecedence  in  time,  the  remedy 
for  the  evil  is  not  with  the  Arminian  and 
the  Wesleyan  in  the  denial  of  the  absolute- 


p8  Determinism  and  Freedom 

ness  of  the  Divine  decree,  but  in  the  trans- 
formation of  it  into  accord  with  the  moral 
perfection  of  the  Creator.  Make  the  de- 
terminism universal,  a  fixed  and  inclusive 
purpose  and  movement  for  righteousness, 
a  comprehensive  device  ceaselessly  striving 
to  realize  itself  in  the  life  of  the  entire 
human  race  in  this  world  and  in  all  worlds, 
and  reconstructed  Augustinianism,  or  Cal- 
vinism, or  Edwardeanism  must  remain  for- 
ever in  the  best  thought  of  mankind.  The 
question  at  issue,  so  far  as  it  concerns  the- 
ology, is  not  between  determinism  and  in- 
determinism,  but  between  the  moral  and 
the  immoral  forms  of  that  sovereign  con- 
ception. 

When  the  student  approaches  this  sub- 
ject from  the  side  of  philosophy,  he  has  to 
bear  in  mind  that  the  charge  of  fatalism 
may  be  brought,  with  considerable  plausi- 
bility, against  the  system  of  every  philoso- 
pher from  Plato  to  Hegel.  Whenever  a 
thinker  begins  with  the  Universal,  when- 
ever the  starting  -  point  is  found  in  the 


Determinism  and  Freedom  99 

Absolute,  whenever  the  Divine  plan  of  the 
universe,  of  human  history,  the  course  of 
nations,  the  fortune  of  families,  the  career 
of  individuals,  absorbs  the  philosopher,  the 
explication  of  the  grand  movement  of  the 
idea  is  sure  to  open  the  way  for  the  charge 
of  fatalism.  The  assumption  or  the  dis- 
covery of  the  Infinite,  the  finding  and 
the  working  of  the  Divine  plan  for  the 
dependent  universe,  will  always  wear  the 
appearance  of  antagonism  to  the  idea  of 
human  freedom. 

But  after  all,  appearance  is  not  reality. 
And  subtle,  perplexing,  ultimately  insolu'- 
ble  although  the  problem  of  moral  neces- 
sity and  moral  freedom  may  be,  it  is  not 
the  blank  inconceivability  that  it  is  often 
represented  as  being.  Determinism  and 
freedom  come  near  being  but  different 
sides  of  the  same  truth.  The  case  in 
which  this  general  statement  may  best  be 
tested  is  the  history  of  mankind.  The 
problem  before  the  mind  of  the  Creator, 
let  it  be  said,  is  the  movement  of  the 


too        Determinism  and  Freedom 

human  race,  from  potential  into  actual  and 
perfected  manhood.  The  movement,  so 
far  as  can  be  seen,  is  possible  only  on 
three  assumptions :  first,  that  God  is  Infi- 
nite Reason  ;  second,  that  men  are  essen- 
tially and  permanently  reasonable  beings  ; 
third,  that  the  goal  of  the  Divine  purpose 
is  the  highest  good  of  the  race.  Unless 
the  movement  is  of  the  Eternal  Reason 
upon  beings  essentially  reasonable,  for  an 
end  intrinsically  good,  it  must  be  a  move- 
ment without  law,  without  justification, 
uncertain  and  vain.  But  beginning  from 
these  three  suppositions,  the  reasonable- 
ness of  God,  of  men  in  their  essential  char- 
acter, and  of  the  goal  of  history,  it  does  not 
seem  difficult  to  see  that  freedom  is  the 
same  thing  as  rational  necessity,  that  de- 
terminism is  nothing  other  than  the  victo- 
rious march  of  the  Divine  persuasions  in 
behalf  of  the  highest  good  of  mankind. 
Certainly,  as  matter  of  fact,  the  power  to 
resist  temporarily  the  Divine  persuasions 
is  lodged  in  man ;  but  this  is  in  conse- 


Determinism  and  Freedom  101 
quence  of  the  irrationality  that  he  has 
brought  up  with  him  from  the  animal 
world  ;  and  in  saying  that  it  was  fastened 
upon  him  by  his  Maker,  the  case  for 
freedom  is  not  even  damaged.  For  the 
power  to  resist  the  immediate  realization 
of  the  best  wisdom  of  the  world  cannot 
surely  be  defined  as  the  essence  of  free- 
dom. This  is  simply  the  defect  of  man, 
the  irrationality  out  of  which  come  all  the 
retarding  forces  in  human  society. 

It  is,  no  doubt,  the  entanglement  of  the 
rational  and  irrational  in  man  that  is  the 
sore  spot  in  the  history  of  the  race.  The 
conjunction  of  the  two  in  the  human  per- 
sonality is  the  work  of  our  Maker ;  the 
early  entanglement  of  the  two  is  the 
outgrowth  of  that  condition  ;  the  chronic 
and  extreme  nature  of  the  entanglement 
is  due  to  the  weakness  of  reason  in  man, 
to  its  failure  to  refresh  itself  from  God, 
and  build  itself  upon  offered  power  into 
practical  invincibility.  The  guilt  of  man 
is  not  primarily  for  his  weakness,  nor  for 


IO2         Determinism  and  Freedom 

the  wrong  that  is  the  issue  of  it ;  but 
for  the  strength  that  he  refuses  to  absorb, 
and  for  the  right  that  he  thereby  fails  to 
serve.  Reason  is  self-conscious,  open  to 
the  influence  of  the  Infinite  Reason,  and 
with  the  purpose  for  the  highest  good 
which  is  native  to  it,  forever  present  in  it. 
But  in  man  this  rational  character  is  in 
association  with  an  irrational  force,  and 
hence  the  duel  of  human  history.  The 
presence  and  persistence  of  moral  evil  in 
the  world  is  proximately  due  to  the  failure 
of  the  weak  human  reason  to  re-create 
itself  out  of  the  Eternal  Reason. 

However,  to  furnish  final  satisfaction 
upon  the  immense  problem  of  the  origin 
of  moral  evil  is  not  the  task  of  this  essay. 
The  question  on  hand  is  the  nature  of 
freedom  as  related  to  determinism.  And 
it  must  be  repeated  that  determinism  sim- 
ply means  that,  inasmuch  as  God  is  a  rea- 
sonable Being,  and  proposes  for  man  a 
reasonable  good  ;  and  inasmuch  as  man  is 
essentially  and  permanently  a  reasonable 


Determinism  and  Freedom         103 

creature,  it  would  appear  that  the  Divine 
persuasions  must  be  finally  availing.  It 
is  therefore  no  other  than  the  highest  as- 
sertion of  human  freedom  and  the  strong- 
est warrant  for  the  reality  of  it,  to  declare 
one's  faith  in  the  continuous  progress  of 
God's  reasonable  and  glorious  purpose  for 
the  race,  and  to  hope  and  labor  for  its  ulti- 
mate triumph.  The  triumph  of  God's 
purpose  would  mean  the  victory  of  right- 
eousness over  iniquity,  the  complete  eman- 
cipation of  man  from  the  dominion  of  the 
irrational  within  him,  the  transformation 
of  his  entire  personality  into  the  unity 
and  peace  of  reason,  and  the  enrichment 
of  that  personality  with  the  possession  of 
the  highest  conceivable  moral  good. 

In  this  process  of  transformation  even 
the  irrational  is  converted  into  a  helper. 
It  becomes  the  limit  against  which  the  rea- 
son pushes  itself  into  clearer  self -conscious- 
ness, the  afflicting  Philistine  that  rouses 
the  inward  Samson  to  moral  hostility,  the 
devil  in  hatred  of  whom  the  love  of  good- 


Determinism  and  Freedom 

ness  swells  to  a  passion.  The  force  of  an- 
tagonism is  thus  broken  into  the  service  of 
rational  illumination.  It  is  as  when  the 
rainbow  appears.  The  white  light,  in  its 
swift  career,  runs  against  the  sharp  edge 
of  the  dark  cloud,  and  out  flows  the  stream 
of  living  beauty,  as  from  a  celestial  wound. 
And  so  long  as  God  remains  Eternal  Rea- 
son, so  long  as  man  continues  a  reasonable 
being,  and  so  long  as  his  Maker  proposes 
for  him  a  reasonable  good,  and  moves  upon 
that  good  in  the  strength  of  Divine  per- 
suasions, moral  necessity  and  moral  free- 
dom will  mean  but  different  names  for  the 
same  reality. 


XI 

Tbe  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 

E  come  now  to  the  ultimate  posi- 
tion upon  which  belief  in  the  im- 
mortality of  man  stands.  That 
position  is  often  little  understood  by  the 
unbeliever.  Whether  he  is  right  or 
wrong,  the  affirmative  thinker  believes 
that  he  has  transcended  himself,  that  he 
has  gone  over  to  the  divine  side  of  the 
universe,  and  that  he  has  heard  the  verdict 
of  the  Infinite  in  favor  of  man.  He  lives 
in  the  progressive  verification  of  the  three 
great  postulates  of  the  endless  life,  —  the 
moral  perfection  of  God,  the  reasonable- 
ness of  the  universe,  and  the  worth  of  ex- 
istence. The  explanation  of  his  supposed 
discovery  will  serve  to  make  plain  the  final 
ground  of  his  belief  ;  at  the  same  time  it 
will  be  his  best  defense. 


106         The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 

Probably  the  deepest  wish  of  a  serious 
mind,  in  regard  to  life  after  death,  is  for 
an  outside,  an  unbiased,  a  higher  and 
wholly  competent  judgment  upon  the  ques- 
tion. The  believer  is  afraid  that  because 
it  is  his  own  case  he  may  not  judge  up- 
rightly upon  it.  This  is  true  of  believing 
human  opinion  generally.  There  is  at 
times  a  profound  suspicion  against  its  im- 
partiality, against  its  honesty,  against  its 
competence.  A  lawyer  does  not  expect 
from  his  excited  client  a  judicial  view  of 
his  own  case.  His  interests  have  dis- 
turbed the  balance  of  his  mind,  have 
spoiled  the  clearness  of  his  vision.  A 
statesman  must  often  revise  and  some- 
times reject  the  notion  of  the  public  good 
framed  by  his  constituents.  They  have 
unwittingly  identified  their  own  welfare 
with  that  of  the  nation.  It  is  not  to  be 
expected  that  they  can  take  a  disinterested 
view  of  the  situation.  And  in  the  same 
way,  a  man  thinking  philosophically  upon 
life  after  death  begins  to  suspect  the  in- 


The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite         wj 

tegrity  of  his  own  thoughts.  His  feelings 
are  deeply  involved  in  the  question.  He 
loves  life,  and  he  loves  a  few  souls  better 
than  life.  He  would  like  to  be  able  to 
believe  that  the  goodly  fellowships  begun 
on  earth  are  continued  beyond  the  grave  ; 
that  the  inspiring  pursuit  of  the  ideal  here 
is  permitted,  under  fairer  conditions,  in  the 
hereafter ;  that  the  aspiration  for  truth  and 
beauty  and  character  that  gives  dignity  to 
the  whole  struggle  in  time  is  to  be  satisfied 
in  the  Eternal.  But  precisely  because  he 
wishes  it  he  suspects  his  judgment.  The 
worn  faces  of  those  from  whom  he  drew 
his  life,  the  cry  of  his  children,  the  voice 
of  youth,  and  the  whole  tenderness  and 
prophetic  beauty  of  human  existence,  ap- 
peal to  him  with  so  much  power  that  he 
must  decide  in  their  favor. 

And  so  a  serious  man  desires  to  see 
himself  as  others  see  him,  as  the  universe 
beholds  him,  as  the  Eternal  regards  him. 
He  longs  for  a  voice  from  the  superhuman 
world,  from  the  great  outside,  unbiased, 


io8         The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 

and  Infinite  Life.  He  feels  that  it  would 
be  an  indescribable  comfort  if  there  were 
any  way  of  interrogating  the  Almighty  and 
of  getting  his  judgment  upon  the  case. 
He  has  become  weary  of  his  own  thoughts  ; 
he  cries  out  for  a  word  from  God.  And  as 
the  seer  when  surveying  Israel,  not  on  its 
best  side,  nor  on  its  worst,  but  from  the 
elevation  where  he  could  see  the  whole 
people,  when  he  broke  forth  in  blessings 
upon  them,  his  outside  and  prophetic  judg- 
ment must  have  been  of  great  value ;  so  it 
would  be  an  unspeakable  satisfaction  to 
man  if  some  one  could  repeat  to  him  the 
verdict  of  the  Infinite  upon  human  life. 

Now  this  is  precisely  the  intellectual 
attitude  of  faith.  It  believes  that  it  has  an 
assurance  from  the  unseen,  a  judgment  de- 
livered from  the  other  side,  an  opinion  that 
is  favorable,  and  at  the  same  time  final. 
It  is  essential  that  this  position  be  clearly 
understood.  Faith  proclaims  itself  to  be 
the  immediate  vision  of  its  object.  Its 
great  beatitude  is,  "The  pure  in  heart  shall 


The  Verdict  of  the' Infinite         109 

see  God,"  not  infer  his  existence,  or  take 
it  for  granted,  or  prove  it  by  piling  proba- 
bilities to  the  sky.  The  pure  in  heart  shall 
see  God,  include  his  being  in  the  rapture 
of  immediate  vision.  Faith  thus  finds 
God,  enters  into  communion  with  him, 
substitutes  his  thoughts  for  its  own,  learns 
to  live  out  of  his  mind  and  heart,  goes  over 
to  his  side  for  the  truth,  and  comes  back 
to  support  itself  by  the  strength  it  has 
found.  This  is  the  great  note  of  faith.  It 
carries  in  its  heart  the  assurance  that  it 
has  abandoned  its  original  position  of  iso- 
lation, ignorance,  and  fear.  It  is  a  sort  of 
solitary  Columbus.  The  great  mariner  left 
the  old  world  behind,  abandoned  its  bar- 
ren security,  put  out  to  sea,  sailed  onward 
into  a  long  succession  of  sunsets,  crossed 
at  length  the  unknown  deep,  found  a  new 
world,  stored  his  ship  with  its  riches,  and 
returned  with  his  vast  prize.  A  similar 
feat  faith  believes  that  it  has  performed. 
It  has  a  surmise,  a  dream,  a  conviction  of 
the  living  God.  It  will  not  rest  in  its  iso- 


n  o         The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 

lation  and  poverty.  It  abandons  its  past, 
sets  out  in  search  of  the  Eternal,  goes 
sounding  on  its  dim  and  perilous  way, 
sights  the  Divine  Reality  at  last,  lands 
upon  God's  side  of  the  universe,  enters 
into  a  sublime  league  with  him,  fills  its 
heart  with  his  judgments,  and  returns  to 
live  and  die  by  them.  The  thing  to  be 
noted  is  that  the  intelligent  Christian  be- 
lieves in  immortality,  not  primarily  because 
he  thinks  it  is  true,  or  hopes  it  may  be 
true,  or  sees  no  reason  why  it  should  not 
be  true  ;  but  because  he  feels  that  some- 
how he  has  reached  the  mind  of  God  upon 
the  question.  He  has  carried  his  case  to 
the  Highest,  and  has  had  the  verdict  of  the 
Highest  returned  in  his  favor. 

This  is  the  intellectual  position  occupied 
by  faith,  and  the  next  task  is  to  ascertain, 
if  possible,  the  paths  by  which  the  believer 
leaves  himself  and  crosses  over  to  the  Di- 
vine side  of  the  universe.  Columbus  had 
the  sea  and  his  ships ;  and  the  believer  is 
not  without  tides  that  set  toward  the  Eter- 


The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite         1 1 1 

nal,  nor  is  he  destitute  of  means  to  ride 
upon  their  calm  or  tumultuous  currents. 
For  close  at  hand  are  the  great  instincts 
that  plead  for  the  dignity  and  permanence 
of  man.  There  is  an  instinct  that  assures 
every  man  of  the  reality  of  the  external 
world.  Analyze  that  reality  as  you  may, 
construe  it  as  you  please,  it  is  there  as 
reality,  attested  by  a  feeling  that  is  uni- 
versal and  practically  invincible.  Science 
accepts  the  external  world  on  the  strength 
of  that  feeling ;  and  every  form  of  idealism 
that  is  not  wild  will  admit  that,  however 
impossible  it  may  be  to  pass  beyond  the 
human  consciousness  or  to  recognize  in  it 
a  reality  foreign  to  its  nature,  still  the  voice 
of  another  is  heard  in  its  halls,  the  pres- 
ence of  another  is  beheld  in  its  home. 
Upon  the  witness  of  a  feeling,  the  trade, 
the  science,  the  whole  fruitful  movement 
of  the  outward  life,  goes  on.  The  reality  of 
the  cosmos  is  first  of  all  given  in  feeling ; 
the  intellectual  justifications  are  elaborated 
from  the  testimony  of  that  simple  and  su- 


ii2  The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 
preme  witness.  A  corresponding  feeling 
vouches  for  the  reality  of  the  moral  uni- 
verse and  for  the  permanence  of  man's  re- 
lation to  it.  The  sense  of  a  universal  moral 
order  and  its  unlimited  claim  upon  the  hu- 
man soul  are  facts  in  the  feelings,  at  least, 
of  civilized  man.  These  divinations  of  a 
transcendent  world,  these  contacts  with  a 
supernal  reality,  these  feelings  induced  by 
a  presence  other  than  human,  are  under- 
neath all  belief,  are,  indeed,  the  mother  of 
all  faith.  To  their  persistence  and  creative 
power  we  owe  the  great  worlds  elaborated 
by  spiritual  insight.  They  are  the  ultimate 
fountains  in  our  humanity,  and  wherever 
they  are  unchoked  they  create  the  river  of 
God.  Their  true  history  seems  to  be  that 
they  are  in  us,  yet  not  altogether  of  us. 
They  pass  through  the  highways  of  our  life 
like  the  wire-paths  for  the  electric  current 
in  the  street ;  they  carry  forward  with  in- 
exhaustible vigor  the  best  work  of  human- 
ity. But  they  do  not  seem  to  begin  or  end 
with  this  earth.  They  are  God's  lightning, 


The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 
drawn  out  of  heaven,  stored  in  human 
hearts,  and  spread  through  human  society 
to  do  God's  work.  Their  character  bids  us 
look  for  a  worthy  cause.  These  feelings 
would  seem  to  result  within  men  from  the 
order  of  their  nature,  spoken  to  by  God  in 
the  night,  and  answering  him  in  the  dark- 
ness and  out  of  the  depths.  They  would 
appear  to  be  the  tides  of  our  being  that  fol- 
low the  pull  of  his  power,  the  secret  and 
sublime  gravitation  of  the  heart  into  faith 
in  response  to  the  call  of  the  Almighty. 
While  the  universe  is  so  great,  and  rea- 
son in  the  multitude  is  so  low,  these  high 
instincts  will  continue  to  be  one  of  the 
strongest  supports  of  belief  in  the  perma- 
nence of  man.  They  do  not  represent  our 
wishes  ;  they  are  not  here  because  we  have 
invited  them.  They  represent  the  Maker 
of  mankind  ;  they  are  his  ambassadors,  and 
they  bring  their  credentials  from  the  Eter- 
nal. They  are  here  as  the  sea  is  here  at 
the  flood,  because  the  universe  rolled  them 
hither,  because  God  sent  them.  Why 


ii4  Tbe  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 
should  the  believer  not  trust  these  high 
feelings  that  originate,  not  in  his  will,  but 
in  his  nature,  these  surges  from  the  eternal 
deep  that  carry  upon  their  white  crests  and 
toss  upon  their  glorious  spray  the  verdict 
of  the  Infinite  in  favor  of  the  life  everlast- 
ing ? 

Kinship  with  the  Infinite,  or  what  in 
religious  phraseology  is  called  sonship,  is 
another  path  to  the  Divine  side.  If  a  man 
should  meet  a  being  whose  language,  signs 
for  thought,  and  symbols  for  the  world 
were  wholly  different  from  his  own,  with 
absolutely  no  point  of  contact  between 
them,  he  would  never  be  able  to  arrive  at 
any  knowledge  of  that  being.  Kinship  be- 
tween them  existing  nowhere,  it  would  be 
impossible  ever  to  come  to  a  mutual  under- 
standing. They  would  be  to  one  another 
like  the  stone  faces  that  stare  at  each  other 
from  the  opposite  columns  of  some  gate. 
It  would  be  sphinx  looking  at  sphinx  in 
endless  perplexity  and  everlasting  silence. 
In  the  same  way,  if  the  Infinite  by  which 


The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite        115 

man's  life  is  surrounded  were  like  this 
strange  being,  an  absolute  and  eternal  con- 
trast to  humanity,  knowledge  itself  would 
be  impossible.  One  would  be  permanently 
unable  to  discover  anything,  to  find  thought 
in  the  heavens  above,  or  in  the  earth  be- 
neath ;  to  understand  the  figure  and  motion 
of  the  globe,  the  orbits  and  orders  of  the 
stars;  to  reach  any  sort  of  science  upon 
any  subject  whatever.  In  that  case  the 
universe  and  human  beings  would  be  to 
one  another  as  Job  and  his  friends  :  they 
would  sit  down  in  silence,  look  at  each 
other  in  dumb  surprise,  and  marvel  at  the 
common  and  eternal  perplexity. 

Because  we  do  know  men  and  things ; 
because  the  world  lends  itself  to  thought, 
melts  into  the  receptivities  of  sense,  runs 
into  the  forms  of  the  understanding,  rises 
into  a  unity  that  corresponds  to  the  per- 
sonal unity  of  the  soul ;  because  the  world 
is  an  intelligible  world,  we  believe  that  it  is 
alive  with  mind,  that  it  is  an  expression  of 
the  Infinite  Mind,  and  that  in  reading  its 


u6         The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 

order  we  are  reaching  his  plan.  The  plan 
of  the  human  mind  in  sense,  in  under- 
standing, and  in  the  personal  spirit,  is  mar- 
velously  adjusted  to  the  surrounding  and 
infinite  universe.  If  men  were  not  consti- 
tuted in  a  certain  way  the  cosmic  force 
could  not  give  them  all  substantially  the 
same  experience  in  the  senses.  The  "  sun- 
shine is  a  glorious  birth "  to  the  normal 
human  being  everywhere ;  the  sound  of 
the  going  in  the  tops  of  the  mulberry-trees 
repeats  its  rhythm  alike  in  the  ears  of 
prophet  and  servant ;  the  rosebush  wet  with 
dew  sends  its  perfume  into  the  faces  of 
all ;  the  fruit  that  is  fair  to  the  eye  is  dis- 
covered to  be  sweet  to  the  taste ;  and  the 
solid  earth  supports  the  steps  of  the  soli- 
tary wayfarer  and  the  tread  of  Caesar's 
legions.  There  is  thus  adjustment  between 
the  Infinite  Force  arid  humari  sensibility ; 
there  is  this  universal  plan  lying  in  the 
receptivity,  and  that  plan  can  be  nothing 
else  than  the  device  of  our  Maker.  There 
is  the  logical  understanding  with  its  forms 


The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite         117 

of  thought.  The  world  must  be  construed 
as  a  world  of  substances,  as  substances  in 
relation,  as  substances  that  precede  one  an- 
other, or  that  coexist,  or  that  follow  after. 
Science  is  the  application  of  these  logical 
forms  to  the  impressions  of  sense  ;  and  the 
fact  that  they  can  be  so  applied  shows  a 
universal  order  in  the  human  intellect,  and 
an  answering  flexibility  upon  the  part  of 
the  cosmos  that  amounts  to  a  marvelous 
correspondence.  Further,  as  man  cannot 
rest  with  mere  multiplicity,  nor  with  mul- 
tiplicity in  mere  order ;  as  he  must  rise 
to  the  highest  form  of  unity,  that  of  his 
own  soul,  and  try  to  construe  the  cosmos 
through  personality,  he  finds  that  again  the 
universe  is  tractable  and  gathers  itself  up 
into  the  expression  of  one  Supreme  Intelli- 
gence. This  preadjustment  between  sensi- 
bility and  the  Infinite,  between  the  effect 
of  the  Infinite  in  sensibility  and  the  under- 
standing, between  the  unity  in  the  Infinite 
and  the  unity  in  man,  is  self-evident ;  and 
it  vindicates  the  belief  that  supports  the 


/ 1 8         The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 

entire  intellectual  toil  of  the  race,  that  at 
heart  man  and  the  universe  are  akin.  Over 
against  the  human  mind  in  manifold  mani- 
festations there  stands  the  universe.  Know- 
ledge is  possible  upon  man's  part,  because 
there  is  a  mighty  characteristic  of  identity 
between  them.  Two  idiots  might  look  at 
each  other  forever,  and  neither  would  be 
able  to  make  anything  out  of  the  other ; 
and  if  one  were  an  idiot  and  one  a  normal 
human  being,  the  same  hopeless  result 
would  follow.  Nothing  like  knowledge  is 
possible  between  idiots,  or  between  a  sound 
mind  and  an  idiot.  And  similarly,  between 
an  irrational  creature  and  an  irrational  uni- 
verse there  could  be  no  communion ;  nor 
could  there  be  any  fellowship  between  a 
reasonable  being  and  a  world  without  rea- 
son. As  Dr.  Fairbairn  expresses  it,  "  The 
madman  could  make  nothing  of  the  sane 
world,  and  the  mad  world  would  drive  the 
sane  man  mad." 

Now,  if  the  universe  and   man   are  at 
heart  akin,  if  in  his  inmost  being  man  is 


The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite         119 

the  image  of  his  Maker,  his  son,  it  follows 
that  when  the  sonhood  in  man  speaks,  and 
speaks  for  life  everlasting,  it  is  the  God- 
hood  in  man  that  speaks  and  speaks  for  life 
everlasting.  Sonhood  in  man  is  but  the 
expression  of  the  Godhood  beyond  man ; 
and  when  the  sonhood  declares  its  judg- 
ment in  favor  of  the  deathless  life,  that 
declaration  is  not  of  man  but  of  God. 
When  the  accredited  ambassador  speaks, 
the  king  speaks ;  and  when  the  filial  con- 
sciousness in  man  attests  his  immortality 
it  simply  records  and  transmits  the  verdict 
of  the  Infinite.  "  If  our  heart  condemn  us 
not,  we  have  boldness  toward  God." l  And 
it  must  be  forever  borne  in  mind  that  the 
belief  in  the  divine  sonship  of  man  is  not 
something  with  which  theology  and  religion 
have  alone  to  do.  It  is  a  belief  that  makes 
possible  the  reality  of  science,  the  reality 
of  all  knowledge  whatsoever. 

Still  another  path  to  the  Eternal  is  the 
truth   of  the   ideal   and   man's   answering 

1  i  John  iii.  21. 


i2o         The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 

capacity.  We  do  not  discover  our  ideals  ; 
they  discover  us.  They  take  us  to  the 
housetop,  as  Samuel  took  Saul,  and  there 
in  the  name  of  the  new  day  that  is  break- 
ing they  tell  us  that  we  are  kings.  They 
find  us  as  the  same  seer  found  David  among 
the  sheepfolds,  lost  to  the  dignity  of  exist- 
ence under  its  dead  monotony,  and  they 
anoint  us  in  the  name  of  the  Eternal.  We 
do  not  create  our  ideals ;  we  awake  to  be- 
hold them  bright  with  an  everlasting  light. 
They  do  not  originate  in  human  hearts  ;  they 
rise  like  the  stars  out  of  the  Infinite.  They 
are  objectively  real,  mountains  at  whose 
base  men  are  born,  and  whose  steeps  they 
are  to  climb.  They  are  the  forms  which 
the  ethical  character  of  the  Eternal  assumes 
in  the  human  imagination,  and  their  sublime 
chant  is,  "  Ye  therefore  shall  be  perfect,  as 
your  heavenly  Father  is  perfect."1  They 
are  moulded  by  unseen  hands  and  colored 
by  the  light  that  enlighteneth  every  man 
that  cometh  into  the  world.  Their  function 
1  Matt.  v.  48. 


The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite        121 

is  like  that  of  the  chariot  of  fire  and  the 
horses  of  fire  that  descended  from  heaven 
and  swept  the  man  of  God  away.  They 
carry  men  out  of  their  appetites,  away  from 
sordidness  ;  they  take  them  from  the  trivial- 
ity and  vanity  of  existence,  snatch  them 
from  the  brute  order  of  the  actual,  and  in 
fires  and  splendors  and  whirlwinds  from  the 
Infinite  transport  them  into  the  realm  of 
duty,  the  world  of  moral  service  and  recom- 
pense, the  paradise  of  truth  and  peace. 
And  whoever  speaks  in  the  name  of  the 
ideal  speaks  in  the  name  of  the  Highest ; 
whoever  renders  the  verdict  of  the  ideal 
repeats  the  judgment  of  God. 

At  this  point  it  is  worth  while  to  consider 
for  a  moment  the  note  of  permanence  in 
man's  existence  in  this  world  of  change. 
To  those  who  have  looked  into  the  heart  of 
the  process  of  knowledge,  and  who  stand 
outside  the  prejudices  of  philosophy,  one  of 
two  things  seems  necessarily  true.  Either 
knowledge  is  a  simple  fact,  incapable  of 
explanation,  a  sheer  and  everlasting  mys- 


122        The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 

tery,  or  it  is  the  work  and  expression  of  an 
abiding  self.  If  anything  in  metaphysics 
has  ever  been  proved,  it  is  the  impossibility 
of  accounting'  for  perception,  memory,  im- 
agination, reasoning,  and  choice,  with  the 
person  who  perceives,  remembers,  imagines, 
reasons,  and  elects,  wholly  ignored  and  even 
annihilated.  Simple  obstinacy  prevails  in 
all  departments  of  intellectual  life,  and  will- 
worship  has  been  a  great  discredit  to  philo- 
sophy. Experts  engaged  in  a  passionate 
polemic  have  too  often,  in  the  history  of 
speculation,  shown  themselves  possessed  of 
a  marvelous  faculty  for  the  evasion  of  what 
would  seem  to  be  a  simple  exposition  of 
reality.  The  evil  can  be  ended  only  by 
insight  into  the  business  on  hand,  by  ask- 
ing how  the  multiplicity  in  sense,  in  mem- 
ory, in  imagination,  in  reason,  and  in  will 
can  be  reduced  to  unity  without  the  activ- 
ity of  the  permanent  soul.  Science,  his- 
tory, art,  philosophy,  and  character  are  our 
greater  unities,  and  it  passes  all  comprehen- 
sion how  they  can  even  appear  to  exist,  if 


The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite         123 

they  are  not  the  varied  expression  of  the 
simple,  perdurable,  creative  spirit  in  man. 
How  the  notion  of  a  universe  ever  dawned 
upon  a  life  that  is  a  mere  multiplicity,  how 
this  ultimate  and  sublime  unity  ever  ap- 
peared upon  the  field  of  thronging  sensa- 
tions and  incessant  change,  must  remain  an 
absolute  mystery.  For  after  all  the  uni- 
verse as  it  stands  in  human  thought  is  not 
given  ;  it  is  made.  And  again,  how  that 
which  has  in  itself  no  unity  can  yet  work 
this  greatest  of  all  wonders,  this  boundless 
order  that  we  name  the  universe,  is  a  puz- 
zle too  hard  for  man  to  solve.  The  old 
argument  for  immortality,  from  the  fact  of 
continuance  amid  change,  from  the  great 
feature  of  identity  and  self -persistence  in 
the  unresting  flow  of  consciousness,  is  good 
at  least  to  the  extent  that  it  carries  the 
highest  in  man  over  into  the  category  of 
the  things  that  abide.  The  rock  that  shows 
its  steadfast  face  above  the  sea  thereby  de- 
clares that  it  is  not  a  thing  of  ebbing  and 
flooding  tides,  of  the  waste  created  by  form- 


124  Th*  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 
ing  or  the  increase  brought  by  dissolving 
clouds  ;  it  discovers  itself  as  part  of  the  en- 
during structure  of  the  earth.  There  would 
seem  to  be,  in  the  fact  of  self-consciousness, 
a  certificate  from  the  hand  of  the  Creator 
of  superiority  to  the  animal  orders  and  their 
fate. 

In  the  moral  sphere  the  unity  which  tKe 
upright  spirit  actually  possesses,  and  the 
unity  after  which  it  hungers  and  thirsts,  is 
still  more  significant  of  the  class  of  exist- 
ences to  which  it  would  appear  to  belong. 
To  entertain  a  single  supreme  purpose 
throughout  life,  as  many  good  men  have 
done ;  to  order  the  entire  capacity,  so  that 
the  greatest  possible  service  may  be  ren- 
dered to  the  elected  cause, — to  Christianity 
with  Paul  and  Luther,  Edwards  and  Chan- 
ning  ;  to  the  emancipation  of  England  with 
Cromwell ;  to  the  preservation  of  the  Union 
of  the  United  States  of  America  with  Lin- 
coln ;  to  the  welfare  of  single  communities 
with  a  host  of  teachers  and  helpers  of  man- 
kind, —  secures  a  moral  unity  for  the  human 


The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite         125 

career  that  is  impressive  indeed.  And  this 
unity  of  device  and  endeavor  is  followed  by 
a  subjective  unity,  by  the  life  becoming  all 
of  a  piece  and  the  piece  of  the  best ;  as  the 
apostle  expresses  it,  "  the  simplicity  that  is 
in  Christ,"  a  condition  of  existence  where 
the  moral  personality  is  harmonious,  and 
where  the  harmony  is  of  the  Highest.  If 
there  be  in  the  universe  an  Absolute  Char- 
acter, the  characters  which  appear  in  good 
men  would  seem  to  classify  themselves  with 
him,  and  to  reveal  his  purpose  concerning 
mankind. 

When  the  fundamental  unity  of  the  men- 
tal life  is  expressed  in  the  persistent  hold- 
ing, through  good  report  and  through  evil,  to 
one  ultimate  and  ever-greatening  ideal,  and 
in  the  steadfast  and  passionate  effort  at  its 
realization  in  human  society  ;  when,  through 
these  projections  of  itself  in  ever-brighten- 
ing vision  and  in  more  consistent  and  heroic 
endeavor,  the  inward  man  is  slowly  but 
surely  coming  into  concord  with  its  su- 
preme aim,  there  follows  the  aspiration  for 


126  The  l/erdict  of  tloe  Infinite 
union  with  the  Highest,  the  consciousness 
of  fellowship  with  God,  the  note  of  perma- 
nence that  then  marks  the  soul  would  seem 
to  be  beyond  dispute.  Human  life  then  ap- 
pears as  if  it  had  gone  over  to  the  Divine 
side  of  things,  as  if  it  had  become  an  abid- 
ing expression  of  the  Infinite  Character  and 
Purpose.  It  is  this  capacity  t(^  share  in  the 
thought  of  the  Highest,  this  aptitude  for  a 
life  concurrent  with  the  Universal  Life,  that 
is  the  deepest  prophecy  of  man's  immortal- 
ity. And  when  the  capacity  is  turned,  as 
in  multitudes  of  cases  it  has  been,  into  an 
ineffable  experience,  it  would  seem  as  if  the 
sense  of  everlastingness  which  it  carries  in 
itself  must  be  trustworthy.  Speaking  of 
Dean  Hansel's  book,  "  The  Limits  of  Reli- 
gious Thought,"  Dr.  Martineau  writes, 
"We  should  rejoice  that  it  had  been  given 
to  the  world  if  only  for  the  reply  which  it 
has  called  forth  from  Mr.  Maurice,  —  a 
reply  which  is  not  merely  the  embodiment 
of  a  completely  opposite  conviction,  but  the 
insurrection  of  an  outraged  faith,  the  pro- 


The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite         727 

test  of  a  whole  character  against  a  doctrine 
which  pronounces  that  all  the  springs  of  its 
life  have  been  delusions,  and  which  tries  to 
pass  off  human  notions  of  God  in  place  of 
God."  *  The  denial  of  the  Divine  universe 
is  the  denial  of  that  which  has  been  the 
source  of  the  best  life  of  mankind.  It  is 
not  simply  a  polemic  against  a  notion  ;  it  is 
a  contest  against  the  deepest  reality,  the 
reality  that  feeds  the  character  of  the  brave 
and  good.  To  tear  the  religious  soul  from 
this  ground  of  its  existence  is  like  uproot- 
ing the  tree.  It  means  death.  That  at- 
tempt may  call  forth  intellectual  defenses  of 
the  immortality  that  is  denied ;  it  must  call 
forth  something  infinitely  deeper,  "the  in- 
surrection of  an  outraged  faith,  the  protest 
of  a  whole  character." 

It  must  never  be  forgotten  that  humanity 
is  involved  in  this  faith,  that  humanity  is 
its  witness.  Upon  the  great  postulate  or 
assumption,  in  the  teeth  of  much  that  seems 
to  contradict  it,  that  God  is  absolutely  good, 

1  Essays,  Philosophical  and  Theological,  p.  283. 


128         The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 

humanity  consciously  and  unconsciously  is 
making  trial  of  its  vast  faith.  It  persists  in 
believing  that  the  universe  is  reasonable, 
and  that  human  life  in  its  best  achievement, 
in  its  best  capacity,  and  in  its  enduring 
moral  need,  is  of  permanent  concern  to  the 
Most  High.  Thus  inspired  it  is  working 
out  its  own  salvation.  Through  the  higher 
instincts,  not  of  one  man,  but  of  all  men ; 
through  the  kinship  to  the  Infinite,  not  of 
single  lives,  but  of  all  lives ;  through  the 
ideals  that  dawn,  not  upon  a  few  favored 
individuals,  but  upon  mankind  ;  finally, 
through  the  great  note  of  permanence  in 
the  soul,  the  universe  would  seem  to  be 
delivering  its  decree  concerning  the  dignity 
and  destiny  of  the  race.  Nor  would  there 
appear  to  be  any  assignable  limit  to  this 
witness  when  humanity  as  a  whole  shall 
acknowledge  its  chief  task  in  this  world  as 
moral,  and  shall  stand  to  it  with  something 
like  the  full  consecration  of  its  power.  The 
ethical  constitution  of  the  race  is  plain,  and 
for  the  purpose  of  this  discussion  it  is 


The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite         129 

weighty  with  prophecy.  But  ethical  expe- 
rience of  an  exalted  type  must  be  added  to 
ethical  constitution.  It  is  hard  for  the  In- 
finite to  speak  through  his  bare  device  in  the 
moral  nature  of  man,  unsupported  and  even 
sorely  contradicted  as  it  so  often  is  by  voli- 
tion and  character.  A  Beethoven  cannot 
fully  reveal  himself  through  musical  signs. 
The  wonderful  symphonies  are  indeed 
there,  but  they  are  hidden.  The  faithful  and 
inspired  interpreter  must  come,  and  through 
groups  of  instruments  unseal  the  fountains 
of  harmony.  The  moral  constitution  of  the 
race  is  but  the  musical  notation.  The  eter- 
nal melodies  are  there,  but  they  are  silent. 
The  race  must  become  partner  in  the  moral 
enterprise,  fellow-worker  with  the  universe 
at  its  ethical  task,  if  its  heart  of  rhythm  and 
soul  of  fire  are  to  stand  fully  revealed.  It 
is  this  voice  that  the  prophet  of  to-day  waits 
to  hear,  the  voice  like  the  sound  of  many 
waters  and  mighty  thunderings,  rolling 
through  all  the  deeper  and  greater  humani- 
ties, the  voice  of  the  Infinite  speaking 


The  Verdict  of  the  Infinite 

through  the  race,  at  length  become  har- 
monious with  his  righteous  purpose  in  his- 
tory, and  registering  his  decree  in  favor 
of  the  immortality  of  man. 


